


The Man Who Waited

by rotrude



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Bare-backing, M/M, Magic, Mourning, Post canon, Reunion Fic, Sex Magic, bullying of an old man, spoilers for the whole of series 5, they meet again, threatened violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-25
Updated: 2013-01-10
Packaged: 2017-11-22 08:58:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 17
Words: 35,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/608071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rotrude/pseuds/rotrude
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Merlin stops waiting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Past the newsagent's, past the greengrocer’s. Cut round that corner. There's the railway track. Merlin trudges on, the usual landscape blurring past him, mostly unheeded. It's not anything he hasn't seen before. And he doesn't always stop there. Not always. This time he won't. No need to feed his hopes. None. He needs to dull them. He needs to look ahead and see the road in front and only that. For now. To shield his old, battered heart. One step at a time. And then one day he'll be done waiting. He'll be done. It's his destiny. 

One step at a time. Now he just needs to carry his old bones home. 

A group of youngsters squawks catcalls at him. They call him hobo. They call him worse things too. They ask him if a cat's pissed over him.

Merlin grunts and works his way past them, summoning his magic even as he tunes them out. Those yobs are actually worse than Arthur's posse back in the day. Unlike Arthur's friends, who however unlikeable, would have risked their lives for their liege on a battlefield, these idiots have no honour. No pride. They're probably not even friends. They're just fools. Picking on the weak.

Once that would have angered Merlin. Today, that's par for the course.

Avoiding the group of idiots, Merlin sneaks down the underpass and emerges a step closer to home. The grey stray cat that's taken a liking to him trots after him, meowing and brushing its head against his leg, its tail held high. “Shoo,” Merlin grunts, trying to shake it off, but the cat persists and Merlin can't do anything but let him follow. “Annoying beast,” he says.

He plods on, stepping over old carboard boxes battered into slime and broken bottles, limbs weary and hands cold. They always get like that this time of year. He should get gloves. Maybe some charitable soul will give him a pair. There's still people like that around, after all. He emerges from the underpass. Light hits his eyes. It didn't use to be like this. Once you could travel from the gloom of the forest and into the light of a clearing without having your retinas assaulted by a flood of sudden brightness. The transition was never as blinding as when modern architecture had a hand in it.

He remembers going on a hunting trip, him and Arthur, the shadows giving way to light, sunlight warming his skin, dazzling his eyes. He remembers shielding them with his hand, complaining about having to clomp all the way across the woods when he could have hidden himself away to steal a nap somewhere in the castle, somewhere far away from cook, who'd rat him out. He remembers Arthur saying, “I didn't think this would turn out to be such a beautiful day.” 

It was a good day. A good spring day a year and a day into Arthur's reign. Arthur had caught two rabbits but a few minutes before and was therefore more appreciative of the bounty of nature than was usual with him. Arthur had had no poetic bone in his body, but on that day one or two positive comments about nature did pass his lips. On that day, there was no grumbling in sight – from Arthur; Merlin had developed a blister earlier on and had been very communicative about it. It had been a wonderful day from start to finish. 

“This one isn't,” Merlin grumbles to himself, remembering the joy of that day. The sun warm on his skin, birds cooing, his footfall muted as they marched on a soft bed of undergrowth. Greenery everywhere. 

Blinking fast, Merlin picks up his pace. Now's not the time to reminisce. Not so much because of how a knot gets in his throat every time he does, as if not a day had passed, but because he knows he's been followed. He's practical enough – see, Arthur, I know strategy – to take note of that and let go of his memories. He would have had to anyway because his magic is flaring up inside him like it hasn't in more than ten years. It does even before he hears the footfall announcing he's not alone.

“Hey, old man,” one of the youngsters calls out. “Care to stop?”

Ducking his head, Merlin makes himself go faster.

“We just want a word,” the youngster says in a lilting tone.

Merlin sighs but doesn't stop. He would have. Once. When he was young and Gaius had to rein him in all the time. He would have then. He would have caused a brawl perhaps. He would have taught the youngsters a lesson and run to Gaius to crow about it. Tonight he just wants to put some food in his belly and sleep. Tomorrow's another day. One day less. Maybe tomorrow will be the day that counts, the day that makes a difference. He will never stop telling himself that that day would come. He will never stop. Never, Kilgharrah, old friend.

“What, are you pissing yourself, old man?” a third boy says just as a fourth one appears right in front of him, blocking his way to the underpass' exit. He must have sneaked past so Merlin could be cornered. 

As Merlin well and truly is. Knowing this just as Merlin does, and probably counting on the strength of numbers – four well-built lads against an old fragile man –, the fourth boy flashes a switch-blade. The metal glints dully but not quite as dully as the light in the youngster's eyes. Dead eyes. The eyes of a man with no soul. The youth's face is, in fact, screwed-up in an ugly rictus that becomes even uglier as he advances towards Merlin. It reminds Merlin of Valiant of all people. The attitude, the malevolence. The cockiness. But there's nothing of the knight of old about this youth. 

“What've you got in your pockets, old fart? We may leave you with your guts in place if you hand it over.”

Merlin senses the other three getting closer. He doesn't even turn. “Believe me, you don't want to do that,” he says.

The youth laughs. “Ha,” he mocks. “And what would you do to stop us from ripping you open, uh? Uh? You miserable old sod, what could you do? Scream and cry?”

“Step away,” Merlin says. “Last warning. Step away.” This boy needs to be gone before it's too late.

The boy tilts his head sideways and then moves, swinging the blade at him.

As he sidesteps, Merlin's eyes flash and go hot. The earth shakes, rumbles, and he feels himself wrapped in light. It's warm, teasing his skin. It plays around him, inside him, washing him clean, making him whole. When the last of the light dies down, he feel his strength at his fingertips.

“What the hell!” switch-blade boy says. “What the fucking hell is that?”

“What are you going on about, Nick?” one of his mates asks, but when Merlin turns, that mate and his pals step back, faces pale.

“That's not fucking real,” one of the boys says. “That's not—”

“Don't just stand there,” boy number three says. “Cut him!”

The boy facing Merlin, switch-blade boy, attacks again. “You really are stubborn,” Merlin says in a voice he hasn't heard in a while. _“Sēcan!”_ he shouts, palm out, hand thrust forward.

The boys go flying, crashing backwards against tarmac and pylons. 

Merlin hits it off at a run. No point switching now. No point. He needs to be safe and not to be associated with the little display in the underpass at all. Or there goes his incognito.

He runs as he hasn't in years, wind in his hair, beating against his face, not quite as it does when you're riding a dragon's back, but whipping at him all the same. A car horn blares at him but Merlin lets himself cross the street haphazardly. Doesn't care if he's hit in passing. He isn't anyway. He careens down the street with vigour, blood pumping fast in his veins, making his heart thunder, asphalt slippery with rain. 

“Watch it, young man,” a middle aged woman he bypasses at a run yells at him and Merlin nearly wants to laugh at the inconsistency. People are never happy.

When he's left the underpass safely behind and rounded the corner to his street, Merlin comes to a halt, soles dragging. He's not even winded. He smiles for a second, before he remembers, and his smiles dulls. His street, right. “ _Forealdian,_ ” he says, and the ache in his bones returns.

He slips home when the sun dips into sunset, switching on the lights without touching the switch. Tiredly, he sinks into his old ratty armchair – it's seen War World II – and closes his eyes. Maybe he just needs to doze off for a while, shut his brain down. No more thinking. Not about the encounter in the underpass -- who'd believe those delinquents anyway -- or the day he's head. Another day when nothing that matters has happened. He just needs to sleep and maybe dream and be back there again. Camelot. He can smell its smell sometimes.

But, no, it's not to be. The grey cat slips in from the window he left open, hopping from sill, to kitchen counter to floor.

It slinks agilely past a chair and settles at his feet, meowing loudly as it did before in the street.

Merlin pats it between the ears, causing it to purr. “I'll feed you. I'll feed you,” he grumps.

Getting upright is always a challenge but the stupid cat is probably starving, so he'd better summon the strength.


	2. Chapter 2

Arthur takes in a big, rattling breath. “Merlin,” he says, pushing up to his elbows. He cranes his head this way and that to find his friend but there's no Merlin. Only a flood of light that nearly blinds him. It's pale but strong, almost too much for his eyes. He can't work past it, so he squints and grits his teeth. 

“Merlin,” he tries again. He must tell him. He must tell him everything he didn't have the time to tell him before, everything he, stupidly, held back. There's no honour in holding back that kind of thing. “Merlin.”

He waits for another stab of pain; for his insides to twist with his next breath. He waits for the numbness misting his brain, which makes it so difficult for him to gather his thoughts in a way that will allow him to talk to Merlin the way he wants to. He remembers trying to say what was on his mind but being unable to. He remembers that with a staggering clarity: wanting to stop his thoughts from spinning so Merlin could know. He must make amends. He must. 

Before he dies and goes without seeing Merlin's smile his understanding and forgiveness. Before he's unable to say the words to Merlin. Others have had his gratitude. Others have been told of the respect he holds them in. Never Merlin. How stupid of him. Never to have spoken before. His pride always guarding his secrets; his walls never coming down and all for what? 

He's so lost in that train of thought that he doesn't notice until a while has passed that there's no pain, no gripping agony, no nausea, nothing.

He sits up, passes a hand down his chest. The armour's still there, rusting around a bloody patch, and there's a hole in the fine thread of his fine chainmail, but he can't feel the wound anymore, that sickening, festering wound that sapped him of his strength. Arthur laughs. “Merlin!” he shouts to the heavens. “You did it. Your magic healed me.”

He hears the footsteps before he catches a glimpse of the figure before him. “Merlin, your magic has--” He's about to promise Merlin a host of free days, a banquet in his honour, a knighthood and more even if he could just think of it, sure to catch Merlin's relieved grin and the dancing of his eyes, sure to spot the happiness in the turn of his lips, when he realises it's not Merlin he's facing.

His fumbles for his sword, but there's no sword at his side. “Where's Merlin?” he asks, wondering whether the woman who's now come to stand before him is a sorceress and whether he should beware. He only trusts Merlin with magic. “Who are you?”

“Arthur Pendragon,” she says, giving him no hint as to what's going on. She's calling him by his name, with which he's well acquainted, thank you, so no help's coming from that front. “Your time has come.”

“My what?” he says, revolving the words in his mind. “I'm not dying anymore. Merlin must have done something. It seems he always does--” He smiles to himself until the smile dies on his lips. “Wait.” He picks himself up, his body working as fine as it did before their last stand in Camlann. “Where is he? If you've hurt him--”

The woman doesn't answer. She's beautiful, all dark hair and skin like moonlight. She looks like a queen, severe and cool. Besides her majestic air, Arthur can detect in in her a sense of alienness as well as purpose. Arthur's sure that she doesn't care about his questions, that she feels she's above them. Well, he only wants one answer. He needs to know about Merlin's whereabouts. And that's it. He only needs for Merlin to be fine, not to have gone and sacrificed himself to heal him, as he surely would have if left to himself. 

If Merlin's gone and done that Arthur will get him back. And wring his neck. Whatever he's done, however, Arthur will find him. Sorcerer or no. He will even if he has to lay down his life all over again to achieve that. He'll get Leon and Percival and Gwaine and find out what's happened to Merlin. Rescue him and bring him back to Gaius kicking and screaming. That old man deserves some respect. See if Arthur doesn't get Merlin back. Arthur's still the king and his will is law. And if that doesn't work, he'll move the earth.

“March forth into the light, Arthur Pendragon,” the woman says, preventing him from formulating any more questions. “Your destiny awaits you.”

It's sound and light, buildings he doesn't recognise the shape of, people he doesn't know the garb of. It's movement and speed and blurry sights. 

A man comes up to him, an air of authority about him. He's dressed in dark colours and wearing a baton. “Hey, are you all right?” he asks in tones that sound foreign to Arthur.

That doesn't matter though. Here's someone who looks much more approachable than the lady that was there when he woke. He must be practical and reasonable and make do. “Have you seen Merlin?” he says.

“Merlin?” the man asks. “Who's that?.”

“Merlin, my servant,” Arthur says. And how to explain Merlin to someone who doesn't know him?

“Your servant?” The man gives Arthur a once over, seeming to focus on his armour. Arthur understands that the blood still on it may snag anyone's attention, especially if they're not men at arms, but now's not the time to dwell on that. 

He'll explain about who he is and why he's still covered in blood – perhaps taking out the magic part – later. (He must protect Merlin's magic.) But now he needs to convey the nature of the emergency to this man. Everything else can wait. “Merlin, yes. He's my friend; he was here and then --” 

Arthur realises that here isn't exactly the place he'd been when he felt the last wave of pain overwhelm him, when he'd just wanted to thank Merlin and tell him, if it even needed to be said, that Merlin had his heart – always had and always would. This is definitely not the same place. Nature's not running quite as free and unfettered here for one. There's no canopy of trees, no soft grass. He's somewhere else. 

“He was close to me,” Arthur then specifies, “and then he disappeared.”

“Are you saying that you want to file a missing person report?” the man asks, looking Arthur in the eye as if he thinks him confused. Arthur gives him the benefit of the doubt. Arthur must look a sight after the three days he's had. 

“Yes,” Arthur says. “Yes, that's what I want to do. And then we'll need to patrol the area and be on the look out for--”

Arthur's interlocutor cuts him off. “We will do that after your friend has been recorded as missing. After 48 hours.” The man hooks an arm under Arthur's. “Now come. I'll show you the way to Wells Station.”

“But wait,” Arthur says, trying to dislodge the man. “Forty eight hours is too long. Anything may happen to him.”

Merlin may already have sacrificed himself to whatever mystical power he'd just thought of to save Arthur.

“It's the law, sir,” the man insists, pulling Arthur in an unwanted direction.


	3. Chapter 3

Merlin wakes with the cat practically sitting on his chest, warm and purring, looking at him out of eyes that are slits.

“What sort of stray are you?” he says, not even attempting to shake the beast off. “You're not supposed to become domesticated. I won't keep you.”

The cat languidly licks at his whiskers. 

Hearing the roll of thunder outside, Merlin sinks back against the pillows. “All right. I won't turn you out right now.”

He's never been a cat person, but he won't refuse shelter to this mangy grey. Not with the weather outside being what it is. They're alike in a way. “Now off,” Merlin says, “or I won't be able to get you anything to eat.”

As he leans down to fill a chipped dish with the rests of a sardine he had in the fridge, a drop of water hits him on the back of the neck. “Another leak?” he says. “Not another leak.”

The cat dashes for the dish but before that it emits some sympathetic mewling. 

When the cat starts shredding the fish with its teeth, Merlin looks up at the ceiling and spots the damp spot. Mould has grown there that he hadn't noticed before. "Fæstnian,” he says, and the drops stop pattering down, the mould stratum receding until there's no more stains left.

He's dressed and pulling on his boots when there's a knock on his door. “Hello,” a young woman says with a smile on her face, a multi-coloured umbrella protecting her from the downpour. “I'm Shanya and I'm from _Age UK_. We're a no profit organisation offering information and advice to the elderly,” she says. “It's been pointed out to us that you live alone and--”

“Thank you,” Merlin says, grabbing the door to show that he's about to close it on the girl's face, “but I don't need your services.”

“We offer computer courses and we have a hotline,” she says, rooting in her messenger bag for leaflets, which she offers to hand him.

“I'm not interested,” he says. He can see she means well, but today he wants to go out for a walk. He doesn't know if he'll trudge back to the lake but he certainly does know that he doesn't want to spend the rest of the morning talking to a girl about the infirmities of old age. He was a physician once -- multiple times -- he knows them well. Beside currently inhabiting a millenia-old body. He nudges his chin forward. “I was going out.”

“Just let me talk about our meetings,” she says. “We often discuss discrimination against the elderly, health tips--”

“Discrimination,” he says, with a short laugh before he steps down, forcing the girl to back off from his front step and shutting the door behind him. “I'm not going to any meetings. Now if you'll excuse me.”

“But have you applied for the Warm Home Discount?” she calls after him as he makes his way down the street, pulling up the hood of his threadbare coat. “You're entitled to £130 off your heating bill!”

Raising a hand in salute even though he has his back to her, Merlin ploughs round the corner and slogs on in the rain until the drab suburban streets give way to a country road coasting the lake. 

The Lake of Avalon.

It has a different name now, he thinks as he threads his way through rivulets of mud to reach the shore. Most of the places he once knew bear different names these days. Even the land itself has changed. The ground has risen, forests have dwindled to be replaced by towns, industrial compounds or motorways. Streams and rivers have changed course. 

The geography of his youth has morphed so much he can't tell anymore where Camelot once lay or where the farmstead that used to be Ealdor is. But it doesn't matter in a way. It's all there in his mind's eye. He can reconstruct Old Albion down to the smallest detail. He only needs to close his eyes and the Camelot Arthur knew will come to him. He can smell it. He can taste it. He can see it with a clarity that makes the world he lives in like a phantom by comparison.

“I remember it for you,” he says to the earth and wind.

Sometimes when he sits here he'll catch a glimpse of Avalon's airy kingdom, the same way he did when he followed the Sophia to it and found out it existed at all. If he'd only known then that his ability to see it was a symptom revelatory of his very essence he'd have probably hidden in his room in Gaius' workshop and never emerged again.

And if he'd known that he would be barred from entering Avalon because of his very nature, he would probably have found himself delving in the pits of despair much sooner.

Sometimes not not knowing is a blessing.

Today he sits on a rock, rain falling in sheets all around him, making the waters glisten like rock crystals hit by a sudden light. Avalon is still as beautiful as it always was. Breath catching, hoping Arthur can see the beauty of it too from the other side, he watches the wind stir the waters of the lake. 

Today the wind is blustery, biting, strong.

But there's more to its lash than usual. That's because it's singing with the voices of the fairies.

As the chant rises Merlin's eyes glow without him having a say in it. His blood stirs with his magic and the chorus becomes something akin to a personal address. “Find him,” the voices say. “Find him.”

Merlin stands. “I've looked,” he says, placing a hand on his heart to quiet its beating. It hurts as if his heartstrings could snap though he knows they won't. “I've waited so long. Don't play with me anymore and tell me how.”

“Find the King.” The chant grows louder, soughing in the reeds like the wind. “Find the King.”

Something is stirring in the thread of the world, Merlin can sense it, but all the same he can't bring himself to believe that his waiting is done. It can't be. _Traitorous heart, please, don't beat so._ It's betrayed him far too often into thinking happiness was just round the corner. _You can save him. You can prevent it. You'll find him._ He never did any of those things. He's thought he'd have him back a thousand times and then a thousand more and it never was. He's never seen Arthur since the day he left him go adrift right here.

He closes his eyes. He can still hear the lapping of the water as it sounded on that day; he can still feel how cold Arthur's skin was when he found the courage to push the boat forwards so it'd be taken by the currents.

“Please, don't play with me,” he says. “Don't."

Even so he focuses on his magic and latches onto thoughts of Arthur. He avoids wading deep into his memories, because summoning a picture perfect past is not his aim today, and searches. He searches for Arthur's soul, hoping he can find it, that he can know it enough to find it, and his magic unfurls brightly the moment he hits on something.

When he finally opens his eyes again, he thinks rainbows are breaking out from behind the wall of clouds hovering over the lake. 

He doesn't need to be told twice. He'll find his king if he's truly back. He'll move heaven and earth to.


	4. Chapter 4

“So you're a re-enactor and you lost the bloke who played your servant,” the man escorting Arthur down the road asks.

Arthur can't quite follow; at least as far as the man's question goes. “No, he's not--” He decides to make it simple. There's some miscommunication going on here and since he can't establish where the snag is he'd better make it as easy as possible. “I can't find my friend and I think he's about to do something stupid.”

The man pushes Arthur up some stairs and into a building full of people wearing the same kind of uniform he does. He sits Arthur on a chair and asks him, “Do you think your friend is at risk of committing suicide?” 

Not for the first time Arthur senses that everything's terribly wrong here. He's tried hard not to focus on his surroundings, which he finds inexplicable, but he realises that answering that question wrongly might cause harm to Merlin. This man is making Merlin sound as though he's touched in the head and Merlin, however odd, isn't crazy, unless you consider his staunch heroics to be folly. “No,” Arthur says at last. “He isn't suicidal but he might think necessity...” 

He trails off because there's no way he can explain that. Not without mentioning Gaius' words about Merlin. And because of the laws that he himself has ratified magic is illegal in the whole of Camelot and, via the alliances he's forged, sometimes beyond. He can't be sure of where he's ended up or of this person's views on the subject. He doesn't know how the man would treat Merlin if he knew. It's just as well that he doesn't speak though, for the man holds his palm up, and says, “Wait here.”

Arthur watches him approach a number of other men and enter the next room but one. He hears the hushed tones of their conversation and his instinct tells him he ought to find out what's going on. Arthur might have been a fool regarding Merlin but he knows when he is being discussed.

A woman sitting at a desk is keeping an eye on him, but she gets distracted when a man walks in cursing under his breath, muttering something about a stolen lorry. Arthur doesn't even ask himself what a lorry is. He acts.

Using the diversion, Arthur sneaks past the woman's desk to get close enough to eavesdrop on the conversation the man who found him is having with his peers. “At first I thought he was a re-enactor. But thinking on it, I'm not sure he is.”

“There's no festivals on right about now.”

“Must be a nutter then,” says the man who found Arthur. “Though there's something he's saying that concerns me. He's apparently missing his friend and this friend is supposedly in danger? He wants to file a missing person report.”

“Maybe we should question him. If he's having us on we can charge him for filing a false report?”

Arthur swallows. There's no universe in which that's good.

A second man taps his chin and says, “But if we let him file it then the responsibility is on us too. I say we call Health Services.”

“Yeah,” the first man, Arthur's helper, says. “That's a good idea. I'm going to question him a bit more and if he gives me any more crazy answers I'll detain him under section 136 until he's approved by the mental health pro.”

Arthur knows that that must be avoided. The last thing he needs is to be detained. He must find Merlin before it's too late and once he has found Merlin he's sure everything will fall into place. He'll find out what kind of enchantment he's stepped into and Merlin will put everything to rights. Just as soon as he's explained what's going on and how he's healed Arthur. Provided the idiot hadn't killed himself to pull that one off.

Trying not to move too loudly, he backtracks until he's slipped past the desk manned by the lady who was checking on him and out the corridor leading back to the exit. He's a few paces short of it, when the man from before shouts, “Stop him. Stop the head-banger with the armour.”

Two burly men close on him but Arthur knows deep in his bones he mustn't let them stop him. He has to get to Merlin. It's a good thing that he feels strong again and that his body responds easily. With a vigour he thought lost, he jabs one man in the stomach, kicks the second in the calf and has the two who've rounded on him downed in a handful of seconds.

Before anybody can regroup Arthur has skidded past the exit and into the open. Now that he's free he has no intention of letting them grab him or of slowing down. He runs instead. As fast as he can, his legs bearing him forward until he's lost all sense of direction. At least he's also sure to have lost the men tailing him too. 

Still he lopes on until he's positive there's no sign of pursuit.

When he's so winded he thinks he might have a fit, he stops, doubling over. It takes a while but his breathing gets back to normal and the stitch in his side stops being on fire. When he's recovered, he straightens and looks around. For the first time since waking earlier he takes a proper look at his surroundings and finds that everything is disconcerting. It's not just the buildings and the odd clothes people are wearing. It's everything. And he's standing out like a sore thumb. 

People look at him as though he's wearing Merlin's ceremonial hat. And he gets why.

No one is wearing cloaks for one. Or chain-mail. Or weapons. If he wants to stop sticking out he needs to get rid of his. He hides in a corner in a place that looks like a park and disposes of them by leaving them on top of a pile of other things that have been clearly discarded. In trousers and tabard only he can more easily blend in with the strange crowd.

But that doesn't mean he knows where to go now or what to do next. He doesn't know where he is, has never seen this place. Nothing seems familiar and he doesn't even know where Merlin's gone or where Camelot is. He might ask, but after the encounter he's just had he's leery of doing that. The man carrying the baton had seemed helpful at first only to prove an obstacle in his quest for Merlin, if not an outright enemy. And what if he's in an enchanted land, a place not governed by any rule he knows?

And what if Arthur's actually dead and this is what you dream of when you're gone? A land without any landmarks, an upside down world? Did his father see this when he died? Is this what's happened?

Fear works its way through him and he leans against a pole of some kind, pushing his forehead against it to feel how cool the metal is. “Merlin,” he says. “Get me out of this.”

If anyone will save him, it's Merlin, so he makes himself say it again. “Merlin.”

And that's when he thinks he hears it, a voice as if in a dream, sounding just as it did in one of his actual dreams, a voice he knows with every fibre of his being, repeating his name as though it's a prayer. 

“ _You came back._ ”


	5. Chapter 5

Merlin runs like the wind. Merlin runs so fast he's defying the limitations of the old body he's shrouded in. Skidding on the still wet pavement he sprints down winding stretches of road, cuts corners, and skips obstacles. He hurls himself at the oncoming traffic, magicking vehicles out of the way, and pushes forwards as fast as he can get his legs to go.

He's pulling one on his system, his body complaining, but he can't even be bothered with that. He felt Arthur call and now there's no way he can stop himself from going to him. He'd fly if he could. He'd shrink the earth so he could get there faster.

When he loses track of the subtle link driving him towards Arthur, Merlin stops, summons his magic and lets it show him the way. He sees the path ahead, the twists and turns of the road, even the ones that lie far ahead. It's as if a flash of thunder was lighting the way for him. Before he's done, he knows where to go.

When he sees Arthur it all stops. Maybe Merlin's stopped time. Maybe he's managed to finally stop his heart. But then again no because it hurts the way it would as if a lance had pierced it. The moment Arthur lifts his face – and it is Arthur's face, with the big eyes that wrinkle when he smiles and the sharp jaw that's as defined as a blade – Merlin's eyes well up and he can't see a thing anymore. His limbs shake and he trembles and crashes to his knees.

Tamping at his tears with the heel of his hand, Merlin's lips quiver into a sigh that rings like Arthur's name. 

Even through his tears Merlin can see Arthur walking to him. He can see him kneel across from him and smile a soft smile that makes Merlin want to cry more not less. That's because it's the warm smile Arthur used to give him when he thought Merlin had done something admirable. It's the smile that made Merlin want to light the sky up with stars for Arthur, the smile he secretly craved to see for those ten brief years he had with his friend. Not knowing what he's doing to Merlin, Arthur reaches a hand out and settles it on Merlin's shoulder, squeezing. “Merlin,” he says. 

“Ar--”

It's no use. He can't really talk. He has no breath to. He can't even hear properly for his heart beating a tattoo in his ears. His chest shakes with heavy rattled breaths and his eyes sting, his lids heavy and puffy. Even though he doesn't want Arthur to see him like this, he can't help it. He wants to smile, crack a joke, say, “It took you a while,” but he really, really can't.

“Merlin,” Arthur says, looking bright and happy, the friend who left such a long time ago, the world ageing and him staying a vivid memory of the man he'd been, forever young, in Merlin's mind. “You did it. You saved me.”

That shakes Merlin up just fine. “No,” he croaks. “No, I failed. I failed you. You died.”

The grip on his shoulder is stronger now. “I'm here. I'm here, Merlin.”

“I know,” Merlin says. Though he's not so sure either. Maybe he's gone as barking mad as people have often thought he was and he's now seeing Arthur, unchanged, before his very eyes. Maybe he's hallucinating Arthur, projecting an image of the man as he'd been in that tavern, gambling with him and trading quips, before Morgana closed in on them. “I know but--”

Arthur cups Merlin's neck, past the long tangled hair Merlin doesn't often comb. “Merlin, don't be stupid now.”

Just to get Arthur to understand how not stupid he's being, Merlin husks, “You left me. You left me behind and I couldn't follow.” Merlin wraps his own arms tight – perhaps too tight – around Arthur, and lets himself enjoy the warmth and strength of this body he remembers so well. Dressing him in the mornings, laying him to bed when Arthur was a little tipsy after a banquet, bearing his dead body and depositing him on that funeral barge. Oh, God, Arthur. He doesn't want to let go, needing to know Arthur's real and not a figment of his own imagination. “I couldn't keep my promise. Any promise. I couldn't die by your side.”

“Merlin, stop it,” Arthur says, pulling him to him so they're chest to chest, almost. His hand is in Merlin's hair and his arm has gone round Merlin. The fingers of his other hand reach out to pick up one of Merlin's tears. Stupid tears Merlin doesn't want to shed. He's old enough and broken enough that he shouldn't cry at the drop of a hat anymore. “I'm whole. I'm good. You succeeded. And even if you hadn't, I wouldn't have wanted you to die.” 

Merlin rasps out an ugly laugh, one Arthur doesn't understand because he says, “No matter now. You did it. You can change back into yourself and break this spell. Get us back to Camelot.”

Merlin wouldn't have thought anything could pry him out of Arthur's arms once he found him. But this does. He swallows. “There's no Camelot, Arthur. Not anymore.”

Arthur's eyes go large with confusion. “But you killed Morgana. We won the battle. I--”

Merlin grabs Arthur's wrist and treats it like a life-line, holding Arthur's eyes because Arthur is owed the honest truth. “Arthur, you died.”

Arthur shakes his head. “You cured me.” 

“I couldn't,” Merlin says, his old-man voice tremulous. “I did fail you, Arthur. There was nothing I could do but let you go.”

“I'm here.”

Merlin nods. “Now. You were gone for such a long time, Arthur.”

Arthur sags back as if he's starting to understand. “How long?”

Merlin wants to lie and tell Arthur that he's been gone a year and a day. He wants to rip the fabric of the earth and summon a vision of Camelot as it once was so Arthur could go back to the world he knew or think he had. 

He could. He could create airy castles that look like the real deal – he's done that once when he was at his worst, despair and loneliness making him think he could fool himself into happiness. He could raise towers and level courtyards. Erect stables and dig wells. He could summon pale images of those who're gone: Guinevere in her finest gown, Gaius in his robes, Percival and Gwaine in their amour.

He could do all that and bespell the land so as to make it look the way it did before Arthur left it. He could create a lie of such big scale Arthur wouldn't doubt him. Not at first. But he can't lie to him. Not anymore. Not even if he has to break his heart.

“Arthur,” Merlin says slowly, “when you died Kilgharrah said you were meant to rise again.”

Arthur frowns. “I don't get it. What's Kilgharrah? Who? I--”

Merlin guesses that all creatures of magic are bound to become cryptic after a while spent roaming the earth and Merlin's been around for quite a long time now. He's even starting to understand Kilgharrah now. 

“Kilgharrah was the great dragon. And my friend. He... was a wise old bastard,” Merlin says, a trace of humour few would understand lacing his tones. The joke's on him now, qualifying others as old. “He knew things. And he knew that even if you died you'd rise again.” It's Merlin who goes for Arthur's hand before imparting the last piece of knowledge that will shatter Arthur. “And you did. One thousand and five hundred years later.”


	6. Chapter 6

Merlin sits him in an armchair and Arthur goes because he doesn't think he knows up from down anymore. “What happened to Camelot?” he asks. 

Frail old body notwithstanding, Merlin folds himself at his feet, his forehead nearly brushing against Arthur's knee when he bows his head. “I never went back.”

“But--”

Merlin lifts his head. Under his snowy eyebrows his eyes are as blue and free of guile as they were before. “For me _you_ were Camelot.”

“Merlin--” 

Merlin prevents him from saying more with a look and perhaps it's just as well. There's not much he can say about the kind of devotion Merlin displays towards him, not without coming up wanting or sounding trite. He's never been good with words anyway. It's no surprise though, Merlin's devotion. He knew of it from before even though the full extent of it only became clear after he'd found out about the magic, when his mind and thought processes started deteriorating. 

As for the rest, what is there to say? 

By virtue of some strange trick of fate he's left everyone but Merlin behind. There's no Camelot. No heritage left. His people are gone. His friends are gone. There's no one to protect. 

“But I know what happened,” Merlin continues with a sad smile. “Rumours reached me. Gwen ruled. She ruled well for twenty-five years.”

“I knew she would,” Arthur says. Gwen is--” 

It's strange to think of his wife as dead. He can still conjure her, alive and warm, and smiling for him. It's like only a few days have passed since he held her hands in his. There's pain in the thought she's no longer there but knowing that she held Camelot for that long is a consolation. It's what he wanted for her. Gwen was a wise woman.

“Then the Saxons came,” Merlin says, his voice more sombre now. “After Morgana died her mercenaries scattered and only a few roamed the countryside. Leon's men were enough to thwart them. But time passed and more Saxons came. I think it was the promise of booty that attracted them. It happened in trickles at first. But then there was more. And more. It was history, Arthur. Not even a sorcerer could have stopped history from happening.”

Arthur is sure that is the truth. Try as he might he couldn't prevent Camlann from happening. He couldn't persuade Mordred from seeking an allegiance with Morgana or Morgana from hiring foreign troops. In the end they all paid for that. “Did Guinevere--”

“She signed a treaty,” Merlin says. “And gave up the throne while retaining some lands and titles. She lived on, safe in a smaller castle up north, a lady to the very end. She made an alliance with Mithian and that helped her keep her stronghold.”

Arthur lowers his head, wetting lips that have gone dry. “Was she happy?”

“After Camlann I never saw her again, Arthur,” Merlin says. “I couldn't bring myself to.” The crack in Merlin's voice makes Arthur look at him again. He's shaking, pale, his gnarled hands knotted into fists. “The very thought of seeing anyone that had known you was too much to bear for long, long years. Going back to Camelot... I would have seen you in every nook.” He shakes his head, wisps of white hair flying about. “I don't know first hand, but I heard tales from travellers and vagabonds. The Queen of Camelot married Sir Leon. And Leon, you know Leon.”

“A good man,” says Arthur, letting out a long breath when no stab of pain presents itself. After all that he and Guinevere went through he feels no resentment. No jealousy. He parted with life in Merlin's arms and even then he wished that she could find the happiness she deserved. He wasn't it. Thinking retrospectively he wasn't it; he gave her too little. “I couldn't have wished for a better man for her.”

Merlin shakes his head. “You gave her the world, Arthur. I'm sure she didn't regret a day.”

Not knowing how Merlin can still see through him so well, Arthur leans forward and puts his hand on Merlin's shoulder. If possible, it's bonier than he remembers, lean Merlin having grown so spare he's barely there. There's less flesh padding his bones now and none of Merlin's former suppleness. Merlin's form comes across as more fragile than even Gaius' ever was. “What about you, my friend?”

“I--” Merlin says. “I waited.”

“You can't only have waited,” Arthur says. He can't envisage waiting for more than a thousand years. Even loyal Merlin can't have done that.

“No,” Merlin says. “Sometimes I strayed. When it was too much. When I thought I was going mad, I would set off into the world.” His tone becomes contemplative. “There were magical crises at first. Monsters and such. Later not so much. Magic has dwindled. There's not that much of it around. You have to look for it to find it. There's been invasions, too.” 

Merlin grins and it's so much Merlin's old grin that Arthur wants to pull Merlin in his arms and hold on to him forever. Despite all the hurt he's having to process Merlin's own pain hits him the most. 

Of all the people he's ever known Merlin's always been the one to wear his heart on his sleeve. And right now Arthur can see sorrow etched on Merlin's face. A thousand years might have taught Merlin to weather it, but Arthur can't accept Merlin's suffering. He plainly refuses to. He should have protected him and spared him any of it. He's Merlin's friend. 

And to him Merlin, thousand year old Merlin, is still the lackadaisical boy who trotted into a prince's, later a king's, room without even deigning to knock. Because Merlin knew, even when Arthur didn't yet, that they were friends. Arthur believes Merlin knew that with the sure fire certainty of the pure. And when all's said and done, Merlin's still an innocent inside or he wouldn't still be so devoted to a cause that even Arthur would have called lost. 

“You'll be happy to know that the Saxons got their comeuppance,” Merlin says with little heart to his quip. “The Normans took over.”

“I want to know about you,” Arthur tells Merlin, knowing the humour for the deflection it really is.

“Mostly I waited,” Merlin says. “The night you... The night you passed I slept by the shore of Lake Avalon. And the next day. Probably the one after that as well.” He shrugs. “At some point Percival turned up on horseback and I told him what had happened. In return he told me that Gwaine--” Even now, after all the time that's passed, Merlin's voice breaks. “That Morgana had killed Gwaine. Percival expected me to follow him back to the castle; he reached a hand out to me, thinking I'd mount behind him. I told him it was goodbye.”

Arthur pushes himself off the armchair and onto the floor. He's done being the king to Merlin's servant. “You can't have done that for a thousand years and more.”

Merlin's hair falls before his face, obscuring it.

That won't do. Despite having successfully kept the truth from him for a decade, Merlin's still a terrible liar. Arthur tucks Merlin's wispy white hair behind his ear and then cups his rugged cheek. “Tell me you had love. Tell me you loved.”

Merlin turns his cheek into his hand. “You're my King.”

Arthur leans forward, pushes their foreheads together, taking in short gulps of air. He tries to catch Merlin's lips with his. He'd wanted to before he died. He'd wanted to so much. He'd tried to make Merlin understand that that was the memory he wanted to take with him, but a few moments later nothingness overwhelmed him. 

His breath coming short, Merlin stiffens and draws back. “No.”

“Is this because you don't--” Arthur starts. He doesn't want to push his attentions onto Merlin if they're not wanted, but he needs to ask. He's learnt now that he must ask questions if he wants the answers. Call it a lesson life's taught him.

“Is this because you're old now?” Arthur tries again. “I don't care about that.” 

Merlin hums under his breath.

“And I know that's not your true form.”

Merlin's head snaps up, sharp and quick. “Why would you think so?”

Arthur leans back against the sofa. “Because sometimes I do listen,” he says, recalling Gaius' words. “Gaius said you were the most powerful sorcerer there was. I'm pretty sure I've never heard of a man who's lived a thousand years and more.”

“I'm magic,” Merlin says, undoing a thread of his clothing. There's reticence in the obstinate tug of his lips. “That's why I'm alive. Doesn't mean this is not who I am.”

“Wasn't the sorcerer that defeated the Saxons who you are too?”

Merlin is quick to look away, his hands busier on that woollen thread than they were a scant minute before. “He was Emrys.”

Arthur nudges Merlin's foot with his. “And who are you?”

“You know who I am,” Merlin says. “This is who I am.”

“Before I died,” Arthur says, not even understanding how any man can say that without it sounding absurd, “I wanted to tell you some things.”

“You did. I remember each and every word you said,” Merlin says with an honesty that pierces his heart. “I know those words by heart.”

“But there was more,” Arthur says. “That I wanted to do. I would have liked to let you have a token of my feelings. That hasn't changed. Young or old.”

“It's not you, Arthur,” Merlin begins. “You're the most noble man I've ever met and I know the way I look like wouldn't stop you, but I can't.”

Arthur's instincts tell him Merlin is still deflecting. He won't ask for that token if Merlin doesn't want to give it, if his friendship entails nothing more than chaste affection, but he needs the truth. “I asked you not to change. You've changed.”

Merlin curls his fingers into his hair and tugs. Arthur has seen him do exactly that countless times: when Merlin's nervous, when Merlin's at a loss for what to do, when Merlin's panicking. Seeing the gesture again fills Arthur with unexpected warmth, a pure staggering wash of it that make his heart contract painfully. “I want you you to be you, Merlin. I need you to be you.”

Merlin must have understood how much he means it, how much he wants there to be no lies between them, because Merlin changes back to the young man Arthur knows so well. 

Slowly, the wrinkles fade; his posture becomes less stiff, his limbs more limber. Merlin's hair goes back to its dark colour. His frame widens and his muscles get some of their bulk back.

Arthur is so happy to see him, see the man that never left his side, day in day out, always with him, wherever he was, during whichever mission, that he goes for that kiss again.

It's done without thinking, but the pain that comes when Merlin turns his head and says, “Please,” is sharp and cuts deep.

“I won't again,” Arthur promises, patting Merlin all the same because keeping his distance seems preposterous. “Just, let's just talk some more.”

Merlin throws his arms around his middle and buries his head in his neck, sobbing great sobs Arthur doesn't know how to stop.


	7. Chapter 7

After Merlin's calmed some, they get to talk more. They do so for hours. Merlin understands Arthur's need for clarity, his necessity to ask questions. He would ask questions too if he were in Arthur's shoes. 

Explaining how the world has changed is no easy task, however. Because the world's not the same anymore, not by a long shot, and he doesn't want to traumatise Arthur with the worst of it. At first Arthur's outlook on the whole ordeal of coming back to a world he can't fathom anymore is positive but the more Merlin answers his queries the more confused he gets.

He acquires this lost look in his eyes and keeps nodding and ducking his head. When he starts getting the measure of how much time has really passed – when Merlin tells him about all the wars, all the new inventions mankind has devised and all the strides forwards humanity has made in fields such as medicine and science – Arthur's questions get sparser.

So Merlin stops going on about planes, which seem to baffle Arthur greatly, and covers Arthur's hand with his. “No need for more now,” he says with a little smile. He can afford to smile now. “Let me get you something to eat.”

“Merlin,” Arthur says, “I'm perfectly capable of feeding myself and you're not my servant anymore.”

When Arthur espouses a cause he does it wholly.

“I wouldn't try supermarkets yet,” Merlin tries to quip. He doesn't want to come to terms with the fact that he isn't anything but Arthur's former servant now. They have a friendship Arthur at last acknowledged but Merlin's still unsure of it. Not on his part, no, he's devoted, but Arthur doesn't need him, least of all now when they have no clear purpose -- not that he wants a new task set by fate -- or common destiny. 

Pushing that thought away, he unfolds himself and starts upright. “And I'm happy to help.”

Without listening to Arthur's complaints – or rather tuning out the actual words in favour of latching on to the familiar voice – Merlin makes it to the kitchen and opens the fridge. There's nothing much that is edible inside. 

An onion, some celery root, and a week old banana that's heavily mottled with black are all that is left. Humming under his breath as he thinks about what to do next, Merlin scratches at the back of his head.

“Do you ever take care of yourself?” Arthur startles him by saying.

Merlin lowers his head. “I'm forgetful and more or less eternal. Food is not that much of a priority.”

“That's not the point, is it, Merlin?” Arthur says, stepping so close behind him that Merlin can feel his breath on his neck and the warmth emanating from his front. If he didn't think that putting some food into Arthur was important, what with Arthur not being like him and not having been fed in eons, he'd probably turn around and wrap his arms around him. 

He'd probably cling too. Somehow he doesn't think Arthur would think well of him if he did that. There were always boundaries between them and while Merlin originally found the breaking of them easy, it wasn't as if he ignored them all the time. Arthur has a martial ethos and gushing is just not something he'd approve of. “I can magic you something,” Merlin says. “It won't be as tasty or actually as nutritious as real food but it's okay. I've tried it before.”

And he has. Famines and food shortages have plagued the world periodically since the days of Camelot. He's fed people this way more than once when he's been able to.

“Okay,” Arthur says, “I was looking forward to seeing you do more magic.”

Merlin's heart climbs in his throat and threatens to choke him then and there. If Arthur had told him that in the heyday of Camelot Merlin would have moved mountains out of happiness. He isn't sure what would have happened precisely, but he thinks he would have imploded out of pure joy. His magic would certainly have got away from him. Yet the real thing, the real moment when Arthur did ask to show him, wasn't a happy memory. It's rather one that still brings tears to his eyes, for Arthur asking him to do magic before he died was a recollection tainted by the knowledge of what happened later. 

Now Merlin just closes his eyes, letting his feelings work freely through him and do what they will. He cups his hands together and thinks about Arthur.

Magic crackles up his spine and when Merlin opens his eyes he's got a handful of strawberries in his palms. They look perfectly ripe.

Arthur laughs, long and clear. “Strawberries, Merlin?”

“I wasn't consciously thinking of strawberries,” Merlin says, heat prickling at his skin. “My magic did it. It's pretty instinctive.”

“So your magic was doing what?” Arthur asks, “thinking I needed to be impressed with an indoors picnic?”

“I don't think my magic went that far,” Merlin says, wanting to avoid the subject. It's not his fault that his magic has conjured strawberries of all things. “My magic doesn't think; it reacts.”

“Pity that your magic wasn't envisaging picnics then,” Arthur says. “I could have used some distraction.”

Hands still full of fruit, Merlin says, “You'll get there, you know. You'll adapt.”

“I know I've got you to help,” Arthur says. “I trust you.”

Merlin secures the strawberries into a bowl, afraid he will drop them for his shaking. It's strange that he should be all a-tremble, but he can't quite get a hold on himself. He hints at a smile though his eyes cloud over with tears. He's a weepy wreck tonight. Maybe this young frame of his is to blame. It's like his senses have awakened from a long, deep slumber. He thought his tears had dried up centuries ago, but that's not the truth now, is it? “Let's see if I can get some bread into you as well.”

Merlin's magic cooperates easily. Well, after it's conjured a bunch of flowers -- primroses -- and a round prune, too. 

They take their food to the other room, the one with the armchair and the leak that is no more. 

Merlin's glad that he fixed the latter. He wouldn't have wanted Arthur to see it. Back in the kitchen Arthur was already giving him speculative glances at the emptiness of his fridge. He doesn't want to feed those suspicions.

They eat on Merlin's shaggy carpet, Arthur insisting that if theirs is to be a picnic then they should go all the way and sit on the floor. Arthur seems hungry and Merlin tops up the bowl with his magic every time Arthur's not looking.

He doesn't eat much himself, preferring to watch Arthur do it, filling Arthur in on the odds and ends of modernity. Arthur listens, and now that he's got some food into him, he seems less sombre about how he's to cope with this new future of his. He even wants to know more about astronauts. (Obviously Arthur would find heroic deeds fascinating. ("The moon, Merlin, really?")

Otherwise he watches Merlin a lot. He does it even as he licks at his fingers or when the conversation stutters, but Merlin supposes he would too if he was faced with another human being for the first time after learning he'd died.

When Arthur starts being curious about him again, asking Merlin how he's lived through the worst history had to offer or what he thinks about magic not being known in this modern world, Merlin gets more and more silent. “Let me make your bed and find you something to sleep in,” Merlin says. “They won't be nice things, I don't--” He trails off, not wanting to get into that. “But I'll get some nicer ones for you as soon as I can.”

Merlin has got to his knees, ready to push himself upright from their pseudo picnic sprawl, when Arthur grabs his wrist. “I don't want to sleep. It seems I've been out of it for long enough already without adding to it.”

Merlin can only feel Arthur's touch, only concentrate on it, his synapses frying up and making it impossible for him to find coherent words. He swallows thickly and has to concentrate on not focusing his everything on their one point of contact. “You're tired though,” he says in a husky tone and with a voice clogged by the threat of tears. “There's rings under your eyes and you've had a stressful day.”

“I've mostly sat here talking.”

“Yes, but think about all the upheaval you've gone through.” Merlin wets his lips. “There's time now. You can take it easy.” He tries to grin genially. “Besides, starting tomorrow we're going exploring, Glastonbury to start with, so you should rest and store up your energies.”

Arthur pouts at him in his best indignant royalty way. “Merlin.”

Merlin, though, climbs upright, taking Arthur with him and dragging him into his room. Objecting at first, Arthur settles into following, though his face falls at the sight presented to him. His eyes go large when he takes in the spareness and shabbiness of Merlin's bedroom. 

Merlin's got to give it to him, Arthur's lips don't turn down and his nose doesn't wrinkle in distaste as it would have done once, but Merlin can't say he doesn't know that Arthur finds Merlin's place dingy.

“I don't understand,” Arthur says, looking from him to Merlin's rickety bed. “You have magic. You could have everything, create things from scratch or sell your services for money.” He shakes his head dumbly. “You could be the richest man on earth, a King of Camelot should by all rights be nothing next to you, and yet...”

“I was born on a farmstead, Arthur,” Merlin reminds him. “I spent ten years using Gaius' backroom as my bedroom. This is more me than you can imagine.” Merlin's lips quirk wryly. “Besides, the Pendragons weren't the only ones who had it in for magic. History is fraught with hatred for those who are different. Better to lie low.”

“I'm sorry,” Arthur says, jaw working as though he's trying to unlock muscles that have tensed. ”If I'd been wiser, if I'd changed the laws, perhaps that would have set a precedent for the future.”

Merlin turns around so he can search the cupboard for blankets. His back to Arthur, he says, “You're not responsible for the all the ills of the world, you know. It takes very little for people to become paranoid and unleash their worst at those they perceive as alien. Fear is a powerful mover, Arthur.”

Arthur makes a small noise Merlin's not sure is agreement. When Merlin spins round, hugging a blanket to his chest, Arthur's looking at him out of big, sad eyes. “When did you become so wise?”

Merlin makes himself smile, but is voice is all manners of thick when he says, “I always was. You just never noticed.”

Even though Arthur's acting as though he's itching to say something, Merlin makes himself busy so he won't have to do more than hum in the right places in response. 

The bed does need to be remade more than turned down, Merlin being lazy when it comes to pampering himself, and those pillows could use some fluffing. Though back in the day Arthur could rough it when on a battlefield, Merlin knows he loves his creature comforts.

And he deserves them. He died for his people; he has a right to be fussy.

“There you go,” he says, when his bed looks the best it can, sheets no longer wrinkly and pillows fat. “Your bed awaits, Sire.”

They share a smile that comes more natural than Merlin would have thought and then Arthur sheds tabard and boots and climbs in, immediately after rolling on his side. However, Arthur can't hide a momentary moue of discomfort at how damp the sheets must be even though he makes a great show being satisfied with his new accommodation. 

As he shifts under the blankets, he looks like a pleased child whose mummy has just tucked him in and it makes Merlin glad. Arthur's so young. He died too young.

His eyes firmly on the figure lying on his bed, Merlin blinks and starts walking backwards towards the door, when Arthur stops him. “Won't you sleep?”

“I--”

“Have I just turned you out of your bed?

“I'll sleep on the armchair.”

Arthur slips an arm out from under the covers, stretches it and pats the flimsy mattress. “Sleep with me.” Colour pinks his cheek. “Chastely.”

Merlin bites his lower lip, fists curling inwards. He's thrumming in place. “Arthur, if you want company, I can sleep at the foot of the bed.”

“For God's sake, Merlin,” Arthur snaps. “You're not a dog. If it's because of what I did before, I apologise, but treating me like a leper is not a solution.”

“No,” Merlin says, shaking his head as his eyes mist over. “That's not it. I--”

Arthur flips onto his back, arms crossed. “Then I don't get you.”

Merlin's answer consists in crawling into bed with Arthur. Even though he makes sure to put some distance between them he frames his body so that he's facing his friend. “Happy now?”

Arthur huffs but a small smile peeks through the cloud of his pout. 

Merlin allows himself to place his hand on Arthur's chest. “Sleep now, Arthur. Sleep. I'll guard you.”

Arthur looks like he wants to object but he must be a little tired for his lids grow heavy and before long he's snoring. 

That sound hasn't changed. The funny thing is Merlin remembers it very well. Through the years he's tried to cling to the little things, small ones like the exact shade of Arthur's eyes when the sun hit them or the harrumphing quality of his snores. And yet that hasn't been enough.

It's stupid how the sound's making him want to cry but it does. It does because he'd forgotten the little hitching sounds Arthur makes before he gets into deep slumber. It's because he's missed this when at the time – all those nights spent camping together or sharing a room -- Merlin was annoyed by these very noises. 

Arthur wouldn't let him sleep and he was the one who'd have to wake at the crack of dawn to wait on my lord. He told Gaius once and Gaius arched an eyebrow at him. “The perks of being someone's body servant, Merlin. I'm sure George would be jealous.”

He was stupid then and he's being stupid now. Age has taught him nothing.

When he's spent the better part of an hour lying in bed stiff as a board, afraid to even breathe too loudly in case he breaks the spell of Arthur's return and yet putting as many inches between him and Arthur as his bed would allow, he decides that he's got to do something. 

He won't sleep anyway.

Stealthily, he puts on the coat he left on the peg in the hall, wraps a scarf around his neck and before opening the door incants a spell that changes him back into the old man he's been for a while now. Scaring the neighbours into thinking he'd been burgled by a scrawny youth would create all sorts of problems he doesn't want to have to solve now.

It takes him hours to get there, both walking and hitch-hiking but when he finds the last corner of what had once been the Impenetrable Forest, he feels relief.

“Mab,” he shouts. “Mab, I need to talk to you.”

An howl hoots mockingly and Merlin can spot its round eyes even from under the cover of foliage. 

“Mab,” he yells again, stomping hard on the soft, mushy ground to let Mab understand that his temper is short. “I need you.”

Moonlight breaks through the canopy of trees and bathes him in its glow. It also changes him back to his young self.

Only then, when Merlin's outward appearance matches that of the Emrys she knew and will always know, does Mab appear.

Washed in a little golden halo, she's perched on a branch sticking out a few inches from Merlin's face. “Hello, mighty warlock,” she greets him. “Let me tell you this. If your face you won't show, your quest will be a miss.”

Merlin dismisses that with a wave of his hand. “Enough of that. I want to know why Arthur's back.” He balls his fists, rage coursing through him at the thought Mab will tell him that he and Arthur are destined to undertake another impossible life quest that will take Arthur away from him again. “Kilgharrah said he would rise again when Albion needed it the most. I need to know what destiny's cooked up for him this time.”

Mab cocks her head as if she's seeing him for the first time. Her lip curls ferally as she inches forward on her hands. “It is not for me to know the workings of destiny. But one thing is clear to me, you're the King's fate. Earth's magic tells me: Arthur's future's not bloody. He's to find his helpmate.”

Merlin re-works the words in his head but he's not sure he understands everything. Bloody fairies, they're never ones for straight answers, and their Queen less so. “You mean to say there's nothing he must accomplish? No mission only he can pull off?”

“The future I do not see,” Mab says, piercing him though and through with her blue eyes. “And yet I can tell thee. Arthur's destiny lies with Emrys; on this you'll agree.”

“But he won't die?”

“When I say this I don't lie,” Mab says, sing song. “Arthur won't die.”

On the last syllable, she curtsies and then with a pop disappears.

The bands of steel that have been crushing his chest ever since Kilgharrah's words floated back to his memory, relax. He'd focused so much on seeing Arthur again, on waiting for him, that he'd quite forgotten to dread his second coming until fear had his guts in a death grip. He will never allow Arthur to be snatched away from him again. And though he can't quite trust Mab, not as much as he would have Kilgharrah, the tight sense of urgency that's brought him here simmers and he can breathe again.

With a tentative smile on his face he makes it back home. A few minutes before dawn lights up the sky again, Merlin lies himself down next to Arthur and closes his eyes.


	8. Chapter 8

When light peeks through the curtains, Arthur yawns and blinks. For a moment he trusts he'll find the canopy of his king-sized bed looming over him. He confidently expects to catch a glimpse of heavy red drapery and to get a cursory view of his chambers. Fireplace and desk, stained glass window and oak wardrobe are most decidedly and conspicuously missing though. 

He wakes convinced that Merlin will be there to stoke the fire and get him breakfast. He anticipates seeing his smile and listening to his jokes. Most of them are stupid but Arthur loves huffing at them in the morning. He loves grumbling and griping, though not per se, just to get a rise out of Merlin, and loves dragging an unwilling Merlin down to the training grounds so he can show him how it is a man fights. Maybe he does just so he'll read amusement and admiration in Merlin's gaze. (However much of a pacifist, 'no, you can't kill that deer' Merlin is, Merlin has a thing for displays of prowess.)

But all he sees is a small square room with white-washed walls and scant furniture the shapes and angles of which are all wrong.

That's when he remembers. Not so much the battle and what happened next, but the fact that he died and that Camelot's lost to him. 

Home is gone. Not just the inheritance he called his, like the rooms he grew up in and refused to give up when he became king, or the familiar spread of the throne room, but the little things as well: the window alcove he remembers seeing his father brood at; the chest with his mother's jewellery and signet ring, the last thing he had of her; or the little chamber atop the west wing stairs he used to hide in when he wasn't taller than a few spans.

Those are gone. The training fields have long emptied. There's no Gwaine to tease him and call him 'princess' or 'my lady'. There's no Percival to contend with during sparring matches. No sedate Leon. No steady Guinevere to smile upon his sillier moments. No wise and knowledgeable Gaius to turn to when in doubt.

Thoughts of Gaius bring him back to Merlin. If Merlin never went back to Camelot he must have missed the old man. They were like father and son; if not in deed, then they were in spirit. Why had Merlin given that up? To mourn him? It's so strange that he should have, almost incomprehensible.

As Arthur turns on his side, his eyes light on Merlin. He's lying supine, hands laced together on his belly, his mouth open, lips tender but a little chapped. He's still wearing day clothes and he's probably got one more layer on than Arthur remembers him wearing before he went to bed. 

He looks soft and ethereal this way, young and eternal both. Looking at him when he is like this Arthur can truly believe that Merlin is a wonder of magic, someone that gods and fairies had a hand in conceiving. Unearthly Merlin, the son of magic.

Despite being born in it, Merlin in a way is not of this world. The devotion of a being such as Merlin is hits Arthur a thousandfold right then. Why? What has he ever done to earn Merlin's love and respect, his constant service, his unrelenting, stubborn commitment?

That too must be of the gods.

Ribcage tightening as if he's been stabbed all anew, and but for the warm glow that settles in his belly he'd believe it too, he puts an arm out and pulls Merlin close beside him. He's so close, in fact, that the tip of his nose brushes against the stubbly side of Merlin's face. If he tilts his head just so it'd be butting against the softer flesh of Merlin's earlobe instead.

Seeking warmth and some human touch, he circles an arm round Merlin, remembering that last wish he had to be held by this man and none other. The pang of loss he experienced then is no longer there though he feels Merlin's presence keenly and lets himself bask in him. 

Even in his sleep, Merlin gropes for his hand and and puts it against his cheek. That makes Arthur smile and his heart give a thump, He drags his nose and mouth across the skin he finds within such easy reach, waking Merlin as he does. 

That Merlin has woken becomes clear when the rhythm of his breathing changes, getting quicker and more patterned the more Merlin stirs.

As he does, the curve of Merlin's lips blooms gently into a smile. Arthur's not sure whether Merlin remembers who he's sharing his bed with, but he believes Merlin's content right in this moment. “Hello,” he says in his ear. “Have you slept well?”

“I should be asking you that question,” Merlin says, stretching surrepetitiously. “I know this is not what you're used to.”

“It was...” The bed is lumpy and the sheets are still damp, but Arthur thinks he understands the value of what Merlin's offering him. His home, as it is. As he wants it to be. “It was fine. I slept for hours on end.”

“That's good,” Merlin tells him. “Because today we're going on your first modern world adventure.”

Arthur moves his hand so that he's sliding it up and down Merlin's stomach, where his skin is warm and reminds Arthur of the good simple things in life. He knows this body. He's manhandled it and touched it and even wanted it before. But there's more to it than that. 

There's a well of feelings and sensations there that goes so deep even he himself hasn't sounded those depths. It's easier not to. He doesn't question the existence of those depths but he doesn't plumb them for fear he will start second guessing himself. At a very simple, superficial level he's glad that Merlin doesn't seem to mind Arthur's closeness and that's enough for now. 

Finding that he can reach out, that this is a boundary he can cross with Merlin's benediction, he sweeps a thumb up Merlin's side and feels the contour of bone and the give of softer flesh. “What sort of adventure is this?”

“Supermarkets,” Merlin says. “It's a staple of modern life. No need to go on hunting trips to get food on your table anymore.”

“But that's half the fun,” Arthur protests, slipping a leg between Merlin's, so they're all a tangle of limbs. “Hunting is a sport. It keeps you strong and fit and your mind keen.”

“But it's boring,” Merlin tells him, turning in his arms and half embracing Arthur of his volition. “If there's one thing I'm not missing it's waiting for hours, come rain or shine, to go down on a kill.”

“You still don't understand what hunting's all about,” Arthur says. “You haven't changed a bit.”

Merlin goes taut. Arthur can feel his muscles bunch and the tendons in his arms cord. “I've changed. You just don't know how much.”

Arthur starts playing with the hair at Merlin's nape. He's always wanted to do it and now it seems like the right thing to do to convey a measure of comfort. It's part of a language he's learning the signs of. Merlin's breath draws in sharply, snagged in his throat. Arthur's meditating letting go, but Merlin doesn't push him away. “You're still Merlin.”

Merlin's smile is tinged with sadness when he says, “There's lots of things that can change you, Arthur. I'm... I'm not who I was. I'm an old man and a tired one.”

Arthur holds the back of Merlin's head firmly, so Merlin can look in his eyes and see no mystification in them. “You're Merlin. I know you,” he says. “I know you.” He pulls Merlin towards him, his scent filling his nostrils. “I'm glad I found you on the other side of death.”

Merlin lets his eyelids flutter closed and his nostrils flare. “What if I lost myself though? What if the Merlin you left and the Merlin you found aren't one and the same. What if Merlin's lost Merlin?”

Arthur's heart clenches for Merlin. “I'll help you find you.”

With Arthur or without him, Merlin has a right to a shot at the most perfect life Arthur can help him achieve. Arthur vows that he will help him find that path and more; he'll make sure that Merlin has everything he deserves. Arthur might not know how to deal with this new world of his, but he knows he wants to accomplish that. It's an important task that he's set himself and better than cowering in a corner because he doesn't understand anything anymore.

He doesn't share his resolution though, not being sure that Merlin would accept it as something that is Arthur's concern. The idiot is so selfless he'd think Arthur's help unnecessary. He'd push Arthur into not heeding him and he'd try do serve Arthur selflessly and to the point of sacrifice as he once did.

Arthur can do right by Merlin without Merlin knowing.

With Arthur's new secret under wraps they don't discuss anything momentous but make plans for the morning; they involve grocery shopping and a gradual reintroduction to the world by way of observation. 

To begin with, Arthur has an odd adventure with the shower – funny contraption and not so easily worked – and spends half an hour waging battle against the clothes Merlin lends him and magics to fit him.

The supermarket they choose to shop at is not close to Merlin's place, mainly because Arthur doesn't want Merlin to turn into the old man, and Merlin doesn't want his neighbours to suspect he's anything but. Merlin asks him if he placed that particular request because he's allergic to wrinkles, and mantains that they lend him a dignity he never had, and Arthur responds by flat out saying, “I don't want you to hide behind masks, Merlin. That's not quite as brave as you think.”

Merlin looks stung but he takes it without saying anything.

Though he does join him on this new adventure of theirs looking like his old self.

When Merlin hands him a basket and says he can pick and choose what he wants and then pay for it after queuing, Arthur's only moderately confused. The market in Camelot, which he never actively frequented but knew of, worked pretty much in the same way. Except things start getting iffier when he's presented with the idea of refrigeration and more specifically of frozen food. “It's supposed to keep your food fresh, just like my fridge.”

“But that's not even proper food!” Arthur nearly shrieks, the concept of frozen soup cubes is so disconcerting. Merlin doesn't have those at home (though to be fair his cupboards are mostly devoid of victuals). “What happened to salting? What happened to eating game fresh from the kill?”

“People only hunt for sport these days,” Merlin hisses at him when they get a glare from a lady pushing a far bigger basket than theirs. “The same kind of posh prats that did it back then. And salted food is a rarity now.”

Arthur still doesn't understand and food is a subject Arthur doesn't fully trust Merlin on. The man is capable of going without or digesting Gaius' gruel, but he accepts Merlin's modern wisdom until proven wrong. He does put back the shrimp pizza thing though. Choosing fruit and vegetables seems easier; at least they're something he can recognise without any prompting whatsoever, if not like like all that much. Give him a joint of roast boar any day.

“I'm not sure about this,” Arthur says, reviewing their purchases. He has no idea how to cook them and nothing of what they've got looks tasty to him. Especially if it comes in boxes. 

“Arthur,” Merlin says. “I can make you a steak and veggies.”

“Because you've since learnt how to cook?”

Merlin rolls his eyes at him. “Because I've since learnt how to survive. Besides--” Merlin leans in to whisper in his ear. “If all else fails, there's still my magic.”

Arthur chuckles. Merlin preens at having made Arthur do that. And then Merlin says he's changed. Arthur doesn't think so. He's still the same though he doesn't know it yet. “So I have to confide in your magic to get dinner?”

“You could always, you know, make dinner yourself.”

Wanting to tease another smile from Merlin, Arthur feigns outrage and bumps hips with him. They both dimple at each other, shaking their head. 

Their behaviour seems to catch the attention of a young man who appears to be very interested in what they're doing and how they're interacting. “Probably disapproves of what he thinks he's seeing,” Merlin says, his face falling even while he herds Arthur towards the self service queue.

But Arthur doesn't think Merlin's right. Merlin may have the advantage of knowing this world, but Arthur's not a complete fool. He thinks rather that the man is looking at Merlin with ill-concealed interest, the way Gwaine used to in the beginning. (Arthur's confident that in his early days at Camelot Gwaine had a thing for his manservat though he ignores what happened later or if Merlin ever knew.)

But that's how he recognises the man's attraction to Merlin; it's in the way his eyes follow Merlin alone rather than the both of them as a duo or in the way he smiles when Merlin runs into a stand and dislodges the merchandise. 

When he gets an understanding of the man's interest in Merlin, Arthur forms a plan. He doesn't share it with Merlin and barely dares think of it himself, but he knows now that there's one thing more he must do.

His mind might be in a muddle right now, especially when Merlin tells him to swipe the bar-code at the reader, but he has one priority. He's no longer a king and he may have no kingdom to take care of, but there's Merlin needing him and that will have to take centre stage.

There's so much he has to repay and Merlin's his responsibility. More, it's what he wants the most right now: for Merlin to smile.

He'll count those smiles until they come as plentyfully as he remembers they did.


	9. Chapter 9

Over the next two weeks Arthur's lessons in everything modern intensify. Merlin instructs Arthur so he knows how to use a telephone, a mobile, and an oven. He also teaches him how to ride a bike and how to get most domestic appliances to work. His laundry may be lost in the process. He buys Arthur a television and a mobile – with money conjured by magic but that's still as authentic as a banknote emitted by the Bank of England – and walks him through the steps required to turn on a computer. 

That happens even if Merlin himself has to rely on a volume of _IT for Dummies_ to educate himself enough to help Arthur. Happily they can navigate the internet even if they don't have a modem since Merlin never needed one before. Merlin's magic is routing the signal.

"Merlin, that's a naked woman."

Merlin blushes watching Arthur leering. "I know, Arthur."

Arthur is sometimes stumped and sometimes not. He's terrible at using a phone and always asks why they can't walk up to people if they need to talk to them. “If it was an emergency, we could summon them.” 

Sighing, Merlin reflects that sometimes you just can't take the king out of the man and though he gripes about Arthur's power trips as he would have once the truth is that he would never ever change Arthur. Not one bit.

If he fails at technology Arthur is conversely good at things like riding a bike or skateboard and often enough Merlin finds him looking with longing at passing cars. He does that even more once he learns how fast they can go.

As for the other little things that make up daily life, Merlin makes sure Arthur knows how to walk around town without goggling at traffic lights and how orientate himself around Glastonbury and most nearby locations without getting lost. These locations include, upon Arthur insisting, the Avalon Lake.

After a while Arthur says he wants to go exploring by himself because, he maintains, he needs to learn how to cope when he's alone, and Merlin, reluctantly, lets him get out of his sight. That he's secretly dreading something might happen to Arthur whilst Merlin's not there is a secret he doesn't make Arthur a sharer of. Instead, so as not to think about possible outcomes, Merlin decides he needs to make himself useful. 

While Arthur's so taken exploring, Merlin gets busy fashioning him a new identity, providing him with a passport and a paper trail indicating that Arthur didn't spring fully formed into life.

They're discussing applying to unis and faking possession of a background education and therefore the need to settle on one identity, when Arthur takes umbrage.

“I don't want to change names,” Arthur says when Merlin presents him with a list of names he could go by if he just chose. “It'd be like lying”

“You can't use Pendragon,” Merlin says. “It's an odd surname and there's legends about Arthur Pendragon, the Once and Future King." When he sees how devastated Arthur is at the idea of losing is identity, Merlin tries to lighten the mood. "There's films about you, even a cartoon telling the adventures of a kid looking remarkably like a shrunk version of you." At Arthur's glower Merlin puts both hands up. "Hey, Geoffrey of Monmouth went to the length of writing a history book in which he most certainly discussed you. It's his fault if that name is a no-go.”

“But it's mine,” Arthur says. “My legacy. I wasted it, I know, but it's my--”

Merlin goes to kneel by Arthur's side and takes both of his hands in his. “You didn't waste it. You did good, Arthur." Arthur's stuck out lip makes him backtrack and relent on the name issue. "And if it's that important you can have your name. We'll say it's a coincidence, that your dad was a fan of myths and legends and so he called you Arthur on purpose.”

Arthur's Adam's apple works. He surprises Merlin by tackling the one aspect of their conversation Merlin thought he'd bypass. “I did ruin everything though. I didn't give sorcerers freedom. I did keep them under a yoke and people like you suffered." He looks at his palms as if they're blood stained. "I just couldn't see past my prejudice until I _saw_ you.”

“But now you know,” Merlin says. “And that's something. Besides,” he adds, feeling weighted and lost, “there's not much magic left in the world so that's a moot point.”

Arthur's grip on his hands tightens. “That's not the point and you know it.”

“Magic is mostly no longer of this world,” Merlin says, pushing to his feet and letting abruptly go of Arthur. “In the end it didn't matter. We didn't matter.”

It's not often that he lets himself think about that and under normal circumstances he'd be there for Arthur, walking him through his grief over past his mistakes or the loss of small things like the name he has a claim to, but today of all days he can't. It must be Arthur referring to the sorcerers Merlin, too, failed or the time of year – it happened when trees were turning to russet – but there's darkness in his chest, a darkness he can't push away from him however much he tries. 

“Merlin!” Arthur calls after him as Merlin goes to sit on the step to the back garden. It's small and run wild, more of a place in which to string up a washing line than a real garden, but Merlin needs to breathe more than he needs to be comforted by a pretty sight.

However much he tries to though he finds that he can't. His next breath is caught in his chest as if it's a cage. His heart hurts and feels heavy and he can't. He just can't. 

Arthur plops down next to him, his shoulder bumping against Merlin's. He stretches his legs out and places both hands on his knees. Merlin knows that despite making a big show of looking straight ahead, Arthur's stealing sideways glances at him. “I know you never felt you could talk to me. And I understand why. But you can now.”

Merlin sniffles, rubbing at his temple with the heel of his hand. “There's no... You wouldn't understand.”

“I want to,” Arthur tells him. “I don't want to be selfish anymore.”

“You never were.”

“That's arguable,” Arthur says, a weight to his tone that makes his voice solemn even as he tries to undercut himself. “I don't want to force you and I understand if you don't want to confide in me. But I'd appreciate it if you let me be of help. So I can be good for something this time around.”

Merlin can take a lot of things but Arthur's plea and stupid dwelling on his shortcomings shatters him more than his own loss. “I'm not sure you'd understand.”

Arthur cocks his head at him. “Maybe.” He smiles sadly, eyes crinkling despite the lack of sparkle in them. “Try me.”

“Some time after you went to Avalon,” Merlin says, “the great dragon died.”

Little wrinkles appear on Arthur's forehead. “The great dragon that was your friend but that tried to burn Camelot? The one you told me I'd killed when I obviously hadn't?”

Even if Merlin thought it'd be there, there's no anger to Arthur's words although his confusion's clear. During that two day quest aimed at saving Arthur's life, Arthur and Merlin had no time to really discuss anything. The revelation of Merlin's magic came about but the details that went with it were never shared. It's high time Merlin explain. 

“When Kilgharrah attacked Camelot he was mad with grief,” Merlin says, remembering the events leading up to the Great Dragon's flight and his part in them. “Your father had kept him locked up for twenty years. Twenty years. All a dragon yearns for is flying.”

Arthur swipes his thumb across his knee, smoothing the fabric of his trousers while glancing down at the tawny-coloured wool. “You speak as if you know.”

“I do,” Merlin tells him, looking up at the sky in the hopes of catching a strand of magic hanging in the air like brine to tree leaves. “As much as a human being can. I'm... I was a dragonlord, Arthur.”

Arthur's frown suggests to Merlin that Arthur is remembering the lore relating to dragons and probably recollecting their mission to find the last Dragonlord. “Balinor,” he says. “He was the last.”

“He was...”

Arthur guesses on his own. “Your father. He was your father, wasn't he?” He smacks a hand hard on his thigh. “I should have known. With the way you were after he died, I should've seen it.” Arthur shakes his head as if he can't believe his own lack of insight. He does that until his eyes narrow. “But you said you 'were' a dragonlord. You're fine though. You're alive. Why are you talking in the past tense?”

“Because Kilgharrah died.”

The memory of Kilgharrah swooping down to say goodbye has stayed with him for centuries.

_Kilgharrah crouched on the ground, big majestic animal that he was, his pain calling to Merlin as if it was his own._

_“It's not time,” Merlin told the creature, walking up to him to look in his big, suffering eyes. “It not time, yet.” Merlin put his hand on the scaly dragon's skin, as close to Kilgharrah's heart as he could. He could feel its faltering beats._

_“Alas, it is, young warlock,” Kilgharrah said. “I couldn't quite bear to go without a final farewell.”_

_Merlin shook his head in denial._

_“It's the way of things, Merlin,” Kilgharrah said. “I've lived long, so long men can't contemplate the span of my life. It's time go, for my body is failing me.”_

_Merlin couldn't quite see his eyes were so blurry. He leaned against the dragon, both of his hands splayed on the hard shell of his skin. Vocal cords straining and working past the lump in his throat, he said, “I can heal you. I'm powerful.”_

_“Not even you can achieve that.”_

_Merlin buried his head in the dragon's side, the fact that it was rising and falling with every exhalation was a consolation suggesting that not all hope was lost. “Don't leave me.”_

_“Merlin.”_

_“Would it take all of my power?” Merlin asked. “I can live without it.”_

_“It would take far more than that, Merlin,” Kilgharrah said gently._

_“My life?” Merlin asked, closing his eyes. He wanted to see Arthur again. The only reason he found himself able to go on and live life was Kilgharrah's promise that Arthur would rise again. He didn't want to give up on that, had vowed he would stand by Arthur should he come again, but Kilgharrah's pain was his too and he couldn't stand it. They were linked by bonds forged by nature and magic that were so strong Merlin didn't know how to untangle them. He was a part of Kilfharrah as much as Kilgharrah was a part of him. He could stop clinging to the mythical hope of Arthur's return for the dragon even while he couldn't conceive the idea of Arthur returning without him. His emotions were conflicted, but Arthur was far away and Kilgharrah, his father's dragon, was here now, needing him. “I can give you that, too.”_

_The dragon lifted his big snout to spit fire. Weakened by the display, he soon lowered his head on the grass. “Not even your life, Emrys, is a fair trade for a dragon's. Accept my death.”_

_“No.” Merlin wasn't even trying to hide his tears anymore. He was alone, nobody here to see him, and he was going to be even more alone now. Only a dragon could truly understand a dragonlord; the loss of that understanding would be immense. Some things were most definitely worth his tears._

_“My spirit will never cease to be, Merlin,” the dragon said gently, nudging his head against Merlin's form. “I'll sleep with the stars, a part of this earth's fabric forever and ever.” The dragon paused to wince in pain but he strove to speak all the same. “Look after Aithusa. She's now the last.” A breath rattled out of Kilgharrah's ribcage and its eyes lost focus. “Good bye, young warlock.”_

_Merlin threw his head back and shouted at the heavens in dragon tongue until he was hoarse and no other sound would come out of his throat._

“Who's Aithusa?” Arthur asks, clearly confused by the name even though he'd been attacked by Morgana's dragon before the battle of Camlann even started, back in the mines that hid the key to all knowledge. 

“The dragon I summoned into being and that Morgana used,” Merlin says. “The dragon that helped killing you.”

Arthur's hand goes to his side and Merlin knows it's instinct and not pain that makes him do it. He himself can't help a wince or stop his stomach from plummeting in abject fear at the reminder that Arthur was once lost to him. Equally, he's ready for Arthur to speak harshly of the dragon responsible for his death and maybe of magic too, and he's surprised when Arthur doesn't. “You're mourning a friend,” he says. “I see why you're so sad and why you think magic's lost. But...” As his words tail off, Arthur slings an arm across Merlin's shoulders and pulls him to him. Instinctively, Merlin puts his head on Arthur's shoulder.

Arthur kisses the top of his head and then looks up at the sky. “But I don't think all hope is lost. I think you should never give up hope.”

“Why?” Merlin huffs, too tired to summon outrage or anger at Arthur's oversimplification. “Because it's not the manly thing to do? I gave up on that kind of preconception a long time ago.”

“No,” Arthur says. “Because you're magic's hope. Because magic is waiting for you. Because I'll help you, useless as I am at...” He wiggles his fingers. “Because you are magic and magic deserves a second chance after what we Pendragons did to it.”

From the position he's in, Merlin can't see Arthur's face. But he can picture the stubborn jut of his jaw. “Time passes; that's why magic's disappearing. It's not your fault.”

“Regardless,” Arthur says. “I don't want you to be sad.”

Over the following days and whenever he remembers Arthur's declaration, Merlin thinks Arthur will probably crack a few stupid jokes and drag him on some kind of quest of his own choosing in an attempt to cheer Merlin up.

What he's not expecting is to be introduced to the Tesco delivery boy, whom he finds in his kitchen carting boxes full of groceries, or to hear Arthur say he needed help carrying those heavy, heavy weights. “Mike's been a great help, Merlin.”

Merlin just has no words.


	10. Chapter 10

Learning about this new world that Merlin has inhabited for so long without him doesn't come easy for Arthur but he makes an effort. He tries hard for himself and for Merlin. Truth be told, learning would be a boring an daunting process but for his friend and the few things Arthur actually finds fun.

Without Merlin, it'd be a hard task.

Without Merlin much of his reaquaintance with living would be a slow and painful deal Arthur doesn't think he would like to go through.

But Merlin's always cheers him on, props him up, even when Arthur feels as if he's failing. Arthur's struck anew with how constant Merlin is, how dependable.

Despite the challenges he's daily to cope with, Arthur would be perfectly content with having found Merlin and living his life out like this, without asking himself about the whys and wherefores of his situation. Unfortunately, something at the back of his brain keeps nagging him. That something relates to Merlin. It's not so much the fact that Merlin's less vibrant than he was. He understands that suffering can tone down your enthusiasm and Merlin's suffered a good deal. But there's a note of sadness to Merlin that Arthur can't bear to witness.

The more Merlin talks about magic, the more Arthur starts to suspect that that's one of the missing components to Merlin's happiness. The lack of magic in the world is what is saddening Merlin. Arthur decides that that is true by comparing Merlin's moods.

When Merlin talks about the magic that was his tone becomes wistful and his eyes dim. That must be it, the cause of Merlin's moods.

Confirmation of his suspicions comes casually enough.

A week into his stay with Merlin, Arthur catches Merlin incanting in the back garden. Merlin is totally unaware of his presence. He doesn't do anything special. He doesn't conjure thunder and lightning as he did at Camlann. He's not repulsing hordes of enemies or flinging back attackers. 

Arthur just spies him kneeling by a bed of flowers that's overrun with weeds. Merlin joins his hands together, whispers something Arthur can't quite catch, and, as his eyes glow gold, he releases a butterfly that simply didn't exist before. The butterfly hovers over the petals of a wild daisy and then zaps away.

Merlin's smile when he watches the butterfly flutters its wings to freedom is the most beautiful smile Arthur has ever seen on anyone and it's awe-inspiring. 

The lack of those smiles in Merlin's everyday life is something that must be remedied. Arthur will fight for them to come back.

At first he has no idea of how make that true but as time passes and he becomes a little more independent of Merlin's twenty-first century life coaching, he gets an idea. Merlin's told him that magic has become a rarity in this world but he hasn't hidden the fact that places such as Lake Avalon are still special.

Arthur simply needs to get in touch with magic. Step number one of his plan.

When Arthur asks Merlin if he should visit the lake while concealing the reason for his interest, Merlin isn't too happy. He doesn't seem to want Arthur to roam the countryside in search of it. He says he doesn't trust it. Arthur believes Merlin's afraid the lake will take Arthur back. Since Arthur knows lakes aren't sentient and that they have no intentions towards him, he's more than dead set to go. Since he remembers meeting a lady before being let loose into the world for the second time, he has an inkling that some sort of magical entity presides over it. If he wants to talk to someone who knows about magic than that's the place to go.

Braving the lake is the only option. He hust hopes Merlin won't worry too much when Arthur's out by himself.

Over the next few weeks Arthur learns the lay of the land and once he has it – and the way to the lake – down pat, he tells Merlin it's time for him to let go of the apron's strings so he can go on walks by himself.

Merlin gradually accepts Arthur's emancipation, even though he subjects him to full body pats every time Arthur comes back. At first Arthur wonders why Merlin should react so but then he begins to think he understands. Merlin's always thinking the worst will happen to him. He’s caught in a loop not even Arthur can shake him out of. He must just believe that that will change in the long run. It will change because Arthur will keep going back.

Even knowing Merlin will be tense all day with Arthur missing, Arthur can't renounce a jaunt to the lake.

Wearing a pair of boots he filched from Merlin, Arthur wades through mounds of mud and makes it to the shore of Lake Avalon. His memories of this place are limited. When he came back he entirely skipped the Lake. When he'd died he hadn't been thinking about it; the only thing that had featured was Merlin.

He guesses that this place has some sort of magical quality to it; there's a mystical aura about it for sure. The light of the sun shimmers across the surface and gilds it a pale saffron. Lights dance across the waves as the wind stirs ripples which diffuse into the shore. Waders circle round it, poking their heads under the surface. Life's rife around these shores and yet everything's quiet and still. 

The lake has to be enchanted.

Even though he doesn't know her name, Arthur bluffs. “Lady, I know you're there.”

In the lake, somehow. 

It's true: Arthur could have hallucinated her. Her order to go forth into the world could have been a product of his addled imagination. But then again he is alive. He met Merlin. Merlin's currently there for him. This tells him he wasn't dreaming. There _is_ a lady in the lake. Or around it. Or above it. Or simply dwelling in a dimension other than this one, the entryway to which is to be found by these shores.

Not discouraged by the silence, Arthur calls for her again. “Lady of the Lake, please, answer me!”

He might not be on a first name basis with her but this will have to do.

As if out of nowhere, the lady appears. Water eddies as she moves but she doesn't sink. She walks towards him, the train of her dress trailing on the surface as if it was a mirror. When she stops advancing, the birds take flight. “King Arthur,” she says, nodding to him. “What has brought you back?”

“I'm king of nothing” Arthur says. “And it's Merlin who's brought me here.”

“It used to be the other way around,” she reflects. 

“Has Merlin come here often?” Arthur asks, trying to get a measure of the centuries he and Merlin spent apart.

“Yes,” the Lady says. “We used to be friends. He lived on these lake shores for a long while. He went. He came back. I have no real idea of how much time passed in between.”

“Your friend?” Arthur asks, delighted to find out that Merlin at least had someone to turn to when Arthur wasn't there.

“He was my love,” she says. “And maybe I was his for a while.”

The information strikes Arthur dumb. It's not that he doesn't think Merlin capable of loving. Arthur thinks Merlin the most likely person to love without reserve. He knows Merlin's love because he himself has always been a friend to Merlin and is therefore in his heart. At least that way. But this lady comes as a surprise. Arthur thinks he should have known about her. But then again Merlin lied to him and maybe he lied about the state of his heart too. One thing is, however, certain: Merlin did love and would love again if offered the chance. “What do you mean: 'for a while'?”

The Lady lifts her arm, her sleeve trailing down like tears. “There were days when I wasn't a spirit tied to a lake. I was a girl, a druid girl. I met Merlin. He made me think dreams could come true and I loved him for it.”

Arthur can fully believe Merlin may inspire a girl – or a man, for that matter – to dream again. “What happened?”

She looks sharply to him, the waters of the lake whirling round her. No storm comes though and nature calms. She bows her head, lovely dark brown locks falling all over he face. “I died. But I get to stay by the lake I loved so.”

Arthur doesn't get the reference though he's sure there's one. “Merlin's not happy.”

“He has had his wish,” the Lady says. “He'll learn to accept that he's found happiness. He just can't trust it yet.”

“I'm not his happiness,” Arthur says. “But I do want him to be happy. I think he's missing magic. The way it was everywhere in the world.”

The Lady scans the lake and then raises her head to the sky. “He's Emrys. And there's always potential for magic.”

“What do you mean?” 

“Magic is woven through the fabric of the universe,” the Lady says. “Just like Merlin's magic. His magic is part of the universe and he is it.”

“You mean to say he can make it all come back?” Merlin would be ecstatic and Arthur's sure he'd see Merlin's happiness written all over his face -- as it should be -- if that were true. 

“Merlin needs to find himself for him to able to restore the balance,” the Lady says. “And you're key to that, Arthur Pendragon.”

That lifts Arthur's spirits. If a magical person – dead woman or ghost – says that Arthur can help, then he'll believe her. Not so much because he trusts magic intrinsically, but because Merlin has faith in this woman and he'll never undervalue Merlin again.

“So there's something I can do?”

“You can help Merlin father more legends,” the Lady says. She's fading, he can tell, but even so she lingers a moment longer. “Love goes both ways, Arthur Pendragon.”

And on that rather cryptic note she leaves, ensuring, however, that Arthur will make amends to Merlin for all that he did while he was alive the first time and for all the years of wandering that have left Merlin so alone and forlorn. For what he did to magic. It's the least he can do.

Arthur doesn't tell Merlin about his visit to the lake or about the conversation he had with its tutelary spirit. He should but he can't. Despite that he doesn't miss an opportunity to question Merlin on magic and its past. When Merlin tells him about the dragon, he opens a new channel for Arthur to investigate and when Arthur's left alone, investigate he does.

Among the modern institutions Merlin's introduced him to there's the Glastonbury library. On his first trip Arthur is accompanied by Merlin wearing his old body. While on the one hand this helps him not make any mistakes about the protocol that superintends the institution – Geoffrey's, for example, was entirely different in that you had to plead to view books–, on the other, it's a spanner in the works of Arthur's plan.

Not because one patron elbows another, asking what Grandpa is doing chaperoning a seemingly thirty-year old around. They both feel the sting of the words but both he and Merlin are wise enough to ignore them. But because Arthur can't quite ask to see the books he wants to consult when Merlin's around.

Yet he can always come back on another day. The next time he's at the library alone and armed with his new book-finding knowledge, Arthur asks to see tome upon tome on dragon lore. He might get a few perplexed and a few hostile glances but Arthur doesn't care. He wants to help Merlin and to do so he must learn his stuff.

That he coincidentally gets to read that snitch Geoffrey's piece of fiction about Camelot is pure happen-stance, though he stumbles upon a passage that is quite interesting and reads as follows, “ _the two dragons, one of which was white, the other red, came forth, and approaching one another, began a terrible fight, and cast forth fire with their breath. But the white dragon had the advantage, and made the other fly to the end of the lake_

That doesn't get him any closer to understanding Merlin's power but he thinks it is a mention of Aithusa, who's such a sore subject for Merlin. That's something at least. That's the first trace that makes up the trail.

At around closing time, Arthur shuts the last book forming a part of his pile and gives them all back to the librarian. He takes out Geoffrey's though. 

On his way back home and after a day spent studying, Arthur realises that he's hungry. He's always said that books were bad in that they made you unhealthy; back in Camelot all those people who spent all their time poring over fat volumes were never quite as strong nor did they ever walk quite as straight as a knight. He's never consciously thought that reading would make a person hungry before but it would seem that that's one of the side effects of the activity.

Why Gaius, who always had his head in a book, didn't eat Arthur out of house and home is a mystery.

In a bid to buy a few edibles, Arthur stops at the supermarket Merlin showed him on their first shopping expedition.

He still feels awkward pushing his basket down the aisles, but it's better now, especially when old ladies help him, saying, “My Bob never could get the hang of shopping either,” or when younger ones do the same, telling him, “You're too much of a hottie to be left all alone." 

Arthur's not sure what a hottie is but he thanks them profusely all the same. For his pains, or rather for being polite, he gets glared at by the same man who was ogling Merlin a couple of weeks before.

“Way to treat your boyfriend shabbily,” the man says, stacking empty crates one on top of the other. 

“What boyfriend?” Arthur asks. Sometimes words can be misleading and Arthur's learnt that modernity makes strange use of them.

“Cheekbones,” the man says, wiping at his forehead. “Your boyfriend you were all cosy and domestic with a while ago.”

Arthur's not stupid. Cheekbones is definitely Merlin; there's no other person he'd define that way himself. It's also evident that the man thinks Merlin is Arthur's sweetheart, that they're promised to one another, and bound to marry. Something along those lines. With a certain amount of sadness Arthur finds himself wishing that the man's assumption were more true than it is.

“Merlin's not my...” Arthur starts talking, trying to come up with words this man will understand. “We're not a couple.

The man looks supremely unconvinced, so Arthur adds, “He's my cousin. We live together.”

Little white lie.

The man lets out a breath. “Really? He's just your flatmate? Well, then I'm relieved. I thought I would get to brood from afar while a major dick got the boy.”

“And in this analogy I feature as the dick?”

The man claps a hand on his shoulder. “Not anymore, no. Especially if I get your cousin's number?”

For a few heartbeats Arthur freezes. It's not just the indignity of being slapped on the back by a total unknown who called him a dick. Merlin's done worse over time so Arthur's used to it. 

(Then again Merlin's Merlin and he has a right to those liberties. Because he's Merlin.) 

It's because he doesn't want this to go down this way. He doesn't want this man to get Merlin. But then Arthur reflects on the Lady's words, her confession regarding Merlin and love, and he reminds himself that Merlin did seek out love once. If he did back then, he might want to do so again. 

Maybe Merlin's just too sad and unused to company to act on that instinct right now but he would surely welcome love if he could. 

Love must just knock on his door. And why shouldn't Arthur facilitate the process?

Arthur's here, no longer dead, loves Merlin with all his heart, and can help. If he's not the one that Merlin wants then the least he can do is find him someone he might end up being interested in.

“Only if you're the decent sort,” Arthur says. “I'm Arthur.”

They shake hands.


	11. Chapter 11

Mike puts the mug down, creating a khaki ring of condensation on the table. “Well, that was good.”

“I'm glad,” Merlin says, trying to look neither Arthur nor Mike in the eye. “At least there's that.”

Arthur lifts Merlin's chipped teapot. “Some more?”

Merlin lowers his head and crosses his arms. Under the table he's tapping his foot. 

Mike drums his fingers on the rim of his mug. “I've got a feeling I surprised your cousin by coming today.”

Arthur looks very self-conscious all of a sudden. While he's never the kind of person to avoid the consequences of his actions, he's at his most shifty today. Merlin's positive he's done something he knows was not one hundred per cent all right.

“Uh, I didn't check in with Merlin about the shopping,” Arthur says, sitting back down, “but thank you for helping with the groceries.”

Arthur apologising that humbly means that he knows he's done something wrong. In other circumstances Merlin wouldn't be sure as to what precisely he's done, but since he's got six foot two of Tesco guy looming large in his kitchen he's confident that Arthur's plan entailed setting Merlin up with said supermarket employee.

“My cousin didn't say he was going shopping,” Merlin says, confirming Arthur's words and sending Arthur a glare that's very, very meaningful. “That's all.”

“Merlin, I just meant well,” Arthur says, busily brushing crumbs off the table.

“Yes,” Merlin says, “I'm sure you did.”

Mike pushes the mug away and shifts in his chair, so he's facing Merlin more fully. “I've also got a feeling I did something wrong. And, look, I'm not about to pretend that I don't know I'm partly to blame.”

Merlin isn't sure he wants to listen to this, but he's survived priestesses of the old religion sending bolts of lightning his way, he can sit through this and sort it out. “You're not to blame for anything,” he says pointedly.

“Your cousin said you were single,” Mike says, messing his hair up with his hands. “And to be very, very honest, I'm not just here to help with the groceries but more because I'm interested in you.”

Merlin would have blushed at that once. From a gangly little kid he grew up into a scrawny boy who didn't often get praised for his looks. When he was, he was flattered and happy. His cheeks would heat and he'd grin from ear to ear without having the ability to control his reactions. Mary, the innkeeper he and Arthur met on one of their outings, preferring him to Arthur was a highlight of his youth, if you didn't consider Freya. It was a highlight mostly because it made Arthur stop preening but also because it was a confidence boost.

Since then though Merlin's worn the old man time and time again. He never gets compliments when he's the old man. All interest in him wanes when he is. He guesses that's but normal but it makes him think nobody's ready to like him for who he is. Anyway that's immaterial too because it doesn't much matter but as something to remember when he considers people in general.

“That's flattering,” Merlin says, flicking a glance at Arthur so he'll get the point and never try to find him someone again, “but I'm not looking for that kind of relationship right now.”

“Merlin!” Arthur very nearly whines. It's as if he thinks Merlin's wrong in not wanting to pursue romantic relationship and he wants to encourage Merlin to go give either this one or other ones a go.

“Arthur!” Merlin uses the same tone on Arthur Arthur used on him. 

It's effective because Arthur splutters and Merlin's a breath away from smiling because he remembers this Arthur, the Arthur who would get wound up about nothing and trade barbs with him, even after they forgot the cause that had set off their verbal sparring.

Mike, though, misunderstands their interactions. “Cousins, my arse,” he says, his inner censor, if he ever had one – Merlin wouldn't know since he doesn't know Mike – flying out the window. “You're together.” He narrows his eyes at Merlin and Arthur in turn. “Or you're cousins and getting it on, which is just--” The self censor comes back for Mike doesn't finish that sentence. That's immaterial because Mike's reaction is pretty clear. He puts both hands up and stands. “I don't know what game you're playing, but I'm not about to take part in it.”

In a huff Mike flounces, slamming the front door, and as soon as he does Merlin vocalises his discomfort about Arthur's strange meddling. “What the hell was that, Arthur?”

“Nothing.” Arthur looks down at his feet as if his ever so slightly repentant child act is about to convince Merlin Arthur truly is innocent of any interference.

“Don't give me that,” Merlin says, voice rising. Shouting feels good. He's got all this youthful energy back and shouting is excellent for channelling his irritation. He gets to his feet to better make a point. Shouting sounds better when it's from a height. “You were trying your hand at match-making, I know it.”

Knowing as much about intimidation tactics as the next person, Arthur gets up too. He puts both hands on his hips as he was wont to do when Merlin failed to do his laundry correctly and lost an item or two in the bowels of the castle. “And what if I was,” Arthur argues. “What if I was trying to help you find happiness after you wasted all that time waiting for me!”

Arthur's eyes flash as the words leave his mouth.

“Wasted?” Merlin croaks, taking a step back until he backs into the counter, making one of the cups that's sitting on the edge rattle, fall and shatter. Hurriedly and so as not to obsess over the word 'wasted', Merlin hunkers down to pick up the shards. “I was doing it for you,” he tells the broken piece of crockery.

“I never asked you to!” Arthur says, still in tirade mode. “I asked you to stay true to yourself, not to give up everything that's ever good in life.”

Merlin sweeps the tea cups fragments into his palm and hisses when he cuts his hand. “It was all I had.”

All the wind goes out of Arthur's sails at that and he goes down on his knees next to Merlin. The moment he's crouching he intercepts Merlin's hand, making him drop the shards he's raked up. “I wanted you to have everything,” Arthur tells him. “I've always wanted you to be happy.”

Merlin snuffles. For once he feels like the boy he once was. He's certainly being as emotional and as confused as he was when he was nineteen and life was one big surprise after the other. “And you thought a muscly bloke from Tesco would do it?”

“He's as fit as a knight,” Arthur tells him, a note of pride for his knights sneaking in his tone. “I thought he could do.”

Arthur's meddling would almost be sweet if it wasn't maddening.

“I don't want that,” Merlin says, his voice now low and rough. “Him.”

That probably needs specifying considering Arthur's flights of fancy regarding Merlin's romantic attachments. 

“Merlin,” Arthur says, closing his hand around his, not caring about the blood Merlin's cut is still shedding. “Companionship is a good thing. I want you to have love. I offered. It's not me. But there must be someone around who can be that for you. Maybe it's not this person, but--”

Merlin's heart stops beating. How can Arthur have got it all so wrong? “When did you offer exactly?” he croaks out.

Arthur tips Merlin's chin up with his free hand. He looks indignant but his touch is gentle. Then again Arthur, for all that he'll hit you when he's rough-housing, is always kind when you're feeling down. “The two times I made a proper and nice advance by kissing you and you...” Arthur segues into nothingness.

Merlin opens and closes his mouth, his heart doing its very best to hammer so fast in his chest it's rivalling the frantic rhythm of his true youth. It's like there's cotton in his ears and all he can hear is his own pulse, the sound of his own swallowing. His vision blurs with tears that want out and he's not sure he's processed what he's saying at all when he blurts out, “I've always loved you with everything I had.”

Which is the truth and nothing but even though Merlin doesn't think love is a strong enough word to encompass his feelings for Arthur.

He has no time to find a better one though, for Arthur presses his mouth to his in a coaxing kiss. It's the softest, gentlest kiss ever, a brush of his mouth on Merlin's. It's lovely and sweet and everything just grinds to a halt for Merlin. It's as if he's just used magic to stop time, which he hasn't thankfully, he checks. But his brain may very well be short-circuiting all the same, just like that old radio he had in the twenties. His magic is currently behaving but the rest of him isn't.

Especially when Arthur deepens the pressure, opens his mouth against his, a clear invitation for more, and Merlin's even more lost.

He's suddenly thinking back to every moment that's led to this but all of that doesn't really matter because his body is rioting with both pleasure and fear this too will be lost. He has to come to terms with all those feelings the word love fails to encompass but he can't in a second.

And then there's the fact that he's never felt so good before (magic aside). Though this might be a little bit like magic, the same giddy heights steaming through him as when he's summoning the earth's very powers.

Merlin's eyelids feel really heavy, more than when he's sleepy or tired, and he lets them droop closed. 

His heart's thundering as if his racing up hill even if he feels otherwise warm and a tad lethargic.

He has a moment to decide how to react.


	12. Chapter 12

Arthur's heart climbs in his throat as he waits for Merlin to respond. So many things hang in the balance and he just hopes with all his might that Merlin will return his overture. It's a raw hope lodging deep in his chest and he quite thinks that Merlin saying no might slay him just as surely as an enemy sword would.

When Merlin's mouth opens to his, Arthur's smiles into the kiss and releases the breath he was holding, pressing his tongue against Merlin's and stroking it softly as he moves inside. It's sweet and slow and it lights a fire deep in his belly. Merlin's tongue feathers lightly over his and it's like Merlin telling him of his love without using words. 

As Arthur moves to withdraw, he cups Merlin's face with both hands, a cradle he makes as gentle as he can, even if he doesn't think he has the hands for that kind of softness, sword calluses and years of martial training having erased that quality in him. He's running the fat of his thumb across Merlin's jutting cheekbones when he notices that Merlin's eyes are no longer blue but an intense, swirling gold. 

“Your eyes,” he says, not eloquently at all. “They're...”

Merlin blinks. “Are they... Have they gone yellow?”

“Yeah,” Arthur says, though he believes that Merlin's definition isn't fitting. “They look like the amber stones on my crown.”

“That's my magic,” Merlin whispers as if he himself is not exactly sure what's going on. “It's surfacing. I'm feeling a bit high.”

Arthur smiles and wipes the ball of his thumb along Merlin's cheek once more. “Does it happen often?”

Merlin reddens. “No, not often, no. Kiss me again.” 

Not needing to be told twice, Arthur pulls Merlin's face down to his mouth and pushes his tongue against Merlin's. His free hand goes to Merlin's hip and since Merlin’s' making pleased noises that fill him with joy and confidence he's finally doing the right thing, he can't help but try to reel him close. As for Merlin, he kisses with passion and stubborn determination. He's sweet and hungry by turns.

Their kiss is still going on when something changes around them. At first Arthur is too focused on Merlin's mouth to notice, but a few seconds later he can't ignore what's going on. They're not in Merlin's kitchen anymore even if they haven't moved at all. They're kneeling on green grass that's soft on the knees, a pure azure sky framing the horizon.

“What's this?” Arthur asks, because he's still fairly sure they haven't budged at all but the are on a meadow, one covered with fragrant spring buds. Dandelions cluster everywhere around them. There's no tiles anywhere and flowers don't usually rear their heads inside Merlin's house. They don't even have an easy time of it in his back garden and they're not there. That seems to be a clue something has changed. “Where are we?”

Merlin looks around. “We're still in my kitchen.”

Arthur ruffles Merlin's hair, slotting their foreheads together as he shakes his head and snorts. “Doesn't look like it.”

“It's my magic ramping up,” Merlin says. “It's making things look nice. How I like them.”

“So you like doing it under the stars?”

“I like what I remember,” Merlin tells him before raising his hands to cradle Arthur's head to draw him towards him. With the pulling and tugging their balance is shot though and Arthur, who was entrenched on his knees, tumbles on top of Merlin. 

He can't say that this is a bad development. He likes feeling all of Merlin splayed underneath him. He likes being able to feel it when he exhales or when his muscles tense with, Arthur hopes, the same anticipation Arthur's feeling.

It seems that's the case, for Merlin slides his arms around Arthur's torso and forces him more fully on top of him. 

Their mouths meet for another kiss. This one's exploring and languorous but more heated than the ones that went before. It fires Arthur's blood just so that kissing stops being enough. 

As his hands roam up Merlin's sides, his mouth takes a turn teasing Merlin's neck. Wanting to explore the little spots that give Merlin pleasure, he nuzzles it with gusto, sucks on tendons and nips the skin at the curve where neck meets shoulder. 

For a long while Arthur's content just mouthing Merlin's throat but then he parts Merlin's lips with his tongue again. 

To speed things up Merlin pushes him off after a while and, grabbing the hem of Arthur's shirt, tugs it off. When Arthur's half bare, Merlin smiles an addled smile Arthur loves at first sight and runs his hands along both his flanks. 

When he's done with that, Merlin starts mapping Arthur's chest with his hands, swiping hot palms across Arthur's pectorals, trailing fingers across his ribcage. It looks to Arthur as if he can't quite stop, his movements feverish but careful. Tenderly, he puts a kiss to Arthur's heart and then his hands start searching for a wound that's no longer there.

No question, Merlin's touch takes Arthur's breath away. Deep down Arthur wants to feel those hands he remembers so well slide along the whole of his body. He wants to have them everywhere, because he's never appreciated how cherished he is as when Merlin holds him. Even so he tries to lighten the mood. “I thought you were the one who knew my body best. I thought you'd be bored with it by now.”

Merlin's voice is shaky when he says, “I thought I'd never get to touch you again.”

“Stupid thought,” Arthur says, kissing Merlin's temple. “I'm here now. Did you really think I'd avoid having the last word over you?”

Merlin's lips quirk. “Having you here is still a bit unbelievable, after all the waiting.”

Arthur draws closer to Merlin, blowing a puff of air against his cheek before he rubs his own against Merlin's. That devolves into him nipping and suckling at Merlin's lips as if he's famished and they're honey. “I'm glad you're here,” he says and wants to add 'I'm glad you never gave up on me', but that's selfish so he keeps it to himself. 

His truncated sentence most definitely doesn't convey everything that he's feeling and thinking, but he admits to himself that even if he'd said it all, he'd have said it badly. So perhaps not running off at the mouth is a good thing for them. How would they even go there, after all? Some things can't just be told.

It's them. Merlin. And him. And their history. How do you put that into words?

Merlin's loyalty is something that very nearly undoes him and gladdens him at the same time. When Merlin touches him with the sheer devotion he's displaying and always has, Arthur's stops doubting he's a good man, even thinks himself the great man Merlin says he is. 

Most of the time Arthur's riddled with doubts about himself but then he takes in Merlin and the way Merlin sees him, believes in him, that fills him with purpose. It convinces him Merlin must be on to something, that Arthur can do and be everything that Merlin says he can do and be. And then there's the fact that Merlin's been so true to him, Arthur doesn't even know how to repay that. Or how not to feel humbled by it.

Merlin touches his lips to Arthur's shoulder, waking up a scatter of goose flesh across Arthur's skin. Arthur tells himself it's the warmth of Merlin's breath that's wreaking havoc on him but that's not all there is to it. 

Needing to feel more, he threads his fingers through Merlin's hair and guides his head down so Merlin can trail his lips down his chest.

Merlin obeys without objecting, the imprint of his smile drawn against Arthur's skin. As his lips move his hands do the same, ghosting across his belly, fluttering softly upwards again, then scoring his back. 

His lips are damp and tease wonderful sensations wherever they scatter their touch. His hands are sure and gentle and proprietary. Merlin's fingers glide over his shoulders, stroke his hair, palm his hips, dwell at the small of his back. With his lips he draws a damp circle around one of Arthur's nipples and then the other. When the second one pebbles, Merlin nips at it and Arthur starts shaking. 

Heat pooling in his guts, Arthur feels himself harden. He inhales, not sure how far Merlin wants to take this, but knowing that no one could ignore the tell tale signs Arthur's giving off now. Before it gets to be too much he should figure out a way to ask what Merlin wants to do.

“Merlin,” Arthur rasps out. “Merlin.”

Merlin draws back and colour rushes into his cheeks. “What?”

Arthur arches an eyebrow and if that isn't telling then he doesn't know how to communicate his plight. Some things you just don't talk about.

Merlin's forehead puckers in thought but as he holds Arthur's gaze Merlin does seem to gain an understanding of what Arthur means. He smiles. “It's okay. I want you.”

Arthur is afraid he's beaming like a batty thing. “That's reciprocal.”

“Now that's encouraging,” Merlin says, tipping Arthur back so he's the one lying on a bed of grass. 

“It tickles,” Arthur says to be silenced when Merlin lands a line of breathy kisses down his torso. “Does it?” Merlin says, stamping more kisses across his belly. “Let's try it like this.”

There's a breeze, Merlin's eyes swirl even more than before, the way they would if a tiny storm was taking place in their depths, and Arthur finds himself lying on a bed of petals. It's soft and strange and less ticklish, but he can't help guffawing. “Merlin, this is embarrassing.”

Merlin's smile stretches wide. “No, no, it isn't. My magic knows best.”

“Not true,” Arthur says. “I'm a...” He wants to say that he's a king and a warrior but he's neither at the moment and however much he thought the loss of both qualifications would hurt, he's now finding that it doesn't. Not when he has Merlin. Not when Merlin's magic doing this for him. There's no need to protest against his predicament. It's... nice. “Flowers are okay.”

“I think they suit you,” Merlin says. 

Even as Merlin teases, his fingers work at the zip of Arthur's trousers. Arthur arches so Merlin can take them off him and there's a familiar vibe about this, Merlin's hands on him, Merlin manhandling him, Merlin divesting him of clothes, that eases him into purely enjoying. 

Without faltering, Merlin gives Arthur's length a stroke or two, then bends to seek Arthur's mouth again. 

Arthur finds himself kissing Merlin deeply, gasping as he works at his mouth while he's receiving pleasure from Merlin.

This, he soon realises, is not by any means enough. They've always been connected somehow, he knows that. He felt that connection when he met that boy who'd speak out of turn to the King’s son and has since. This, letting Merlin do all the work as if he's the servant still, seems too little, especially considering what Merlin is to him. Not giving back is not right. He wants to give back, show Merlin how he feels; maybe without words, if he can. He has a lifetime of missed opportunities to make up for. 

Wanting to do just that, Arthur stops Merlin. “Let me,” he says. 

With hands that are a little shaky he slips Merlin's shirt off, dropping it to the ground. He touches Merlin like Merlin touched him, learning every angle, rise and contour of his body, drawing sharp sobs out of him when he lingers and caresses.

With Merlin's help, Merlin's trousers end up where his shirt did and then Arthur's curling his fingers around him, watching Merlin's face change as his cock fattens. With a blunt nail he follows the length of the large vein that runs along its back; rubs the tip with his forefinger until Merlin shakes and reddens all over and Arthur has to calm him with a hand across his back.

As he coaxes moisture from under the foreskin, Merlin closes his eyes and things start happening around them. 

The sky changes colour; a brook wells up from the dry ground underneath them, and voices, like a crystalline chorus, rise up in a downbeat chant. Small creatures pop up from the cradle of flower buds, their tiny wings flapping, as they play with a thousand little rainbows that curtain Merlin and Arthur's doings from their eyes. 

In acknowledgement of Arthur's attentions, Merlin's hands go through Arthur's hair, gently combing it back, mussing it up, fingers threading through it. Arthur takes it all to mean that Merlin's loving what Arthur's doing so he continues, leaning up on his elbows to flutter his lips around the tip of his cock.

Merlin's nostrils flare as Arthur nuzzles him and he moans when Arthur seals his lips tighter and tighter around him, suckling when Merlin thrusts his hips forward. When Arthur's not sure he can handle the whole of Merlin's length down his throat, he lets his mouth go back the top, licking and wetly sucking the head. 

When Merlin makes a noise that sounds like Arthur's broken him, Arthur gives him a brief moment of respite, then he slides down, gets Merlin to spread his thighs, and his face level with Merlin's arse. 

Now this should probably be embarrassing since he's never exactly done this before. For as long as he lived his first lease of life, this act was a taboo for the nobility – unclean, filthy, only the peasants did it because they _were_ filthy themselves. But he can't seem to summon any outrage or care. He's past that kind of boundary with Merlin. And he wants this. He really does, thoughts numbing lustily in his brain and his cock throbbing between his legs.

His conviction strong, Arthur strokes Merlin's hole with a knuckle, breathes on it, kisses all around it, licking Merlin's inner thigh on a detour that leads him back to where he was before. When Merlin's legs start shaking either side of him and their entire world, be it one of Merlin's summoning, glows gold and shimmers like a mirage, Arthur slips his thumb in, then a finger to the second knuckle.

When Merlin's breath gets rugged with Arthur's touch, stardust starts falling from the sky and everything glimmers. If that isn't a clue Arthur doesn't know what is. He penetrates Merlin with his tongue, wets him and, stretches him with fingers and spit.

When Merlin's a shaking mass above him, his chest and face smeared with sweat, his complexion gone from pale to ruddy, Arthur enters him, any pain that might have come on the heels of that eased by magic.

Even so Merlin's breath is pushed out of him and Arthur decides to watch Merlin closely for reactions. His slack mouth, the fierce blush that covers him bodily, the furrowing of his brow that smooths back down as he adapts all tell him that Merlin likes this. At first, though, Arthur doesn't move and merely strokes the inside of Merlin's thighs. 

When Merlin fists himself, working his cock in a progressively unyielding manner, breath coming out in short puffs, Arthur thinks they're good to go and starts with little steep thrusts that get fiercer and fiercer as they move towards orgasm.

"Arthur."

Soon Arthur's pumping straight in in little stoppered jerks that have a raw edge to it. Strong inward pushes build up his rhythm and their pace gets frantic, Merlin rocking back down on him with the same focus that's driving Arthur forwards. 

A grieving moan leaves Arthur's chest as he finds that he's surging uphill towards orgasm and that in a moment he will be done. However much he wants to hold back and make this last and last and last, his body won't obey him. Heavy exhalations record his progress towards climax.

His hips work past Merlin clenching on him. Digging his nails in at Merlin's hips, the thing coiled densely inside him unspools. He comes and shakes until he thinks he's dissolving in tiny fragments of himself.

Merlin splattering his chest with his release coaxes a bark of laughter out of Arthur and recalls him to reality in time to witness Merlin's magical world exploding in colours and whispers of magic.

As the power of the enchantment dies around them, Merlin slumps on top of him, mouth squashed open against his. 

Arthur's stomach flips with contentment as Merlin starts nuzzling his chin, lips pressing, lifting up, and pressing against Arthur's throat, Merlin's warm breath on him in the shape of little mumbled sighs. Arthur's arms go round Merlin and he makes a rather sappy promise to himself.

When Arthur's centred enough to look around again, they're back in Merlin's kitchen, sprawled on the floor.

And yet, even though he can't see them as he could before, Arthur's sure that those magical tendrils he spied before are still weaving their web around them.

It's just that right now he can't spot them. But they're there.

Merlin just snores.


	13. Chapter 13

When Merlin wakes he's lying on belly like a beached whale, his face planted in the pillow. He's in his bed but on top of the covers. The warmth in his limbs suggesting that sex had happened before he fell asleep makes him think that he had a night, or rather late afternoon, with Arthur. But when he checks out the room and realises he's alone, he starts believing he must have dreamt it all.

Maybe his magic summoned a vision of things Merlin has repeatedly wished to be true. A magic enhanced dream, so to speak.

That doesn't explain why he's naked, but it seems plausible. 

For a rather horrible moment he even imagines that he dreamt Arthur coming back but then Arthur waltzes in butt naked and Merlin revises his panic-induced assumptions.

Arthur smiles a goofy smile at him and lies down half next to Merlin, half on top of him. From that vantage point he drapes a lazy, heavy arm around his back and grunts in a satisfied way. He's warm as though he hasn't paraded around the house, which is quite cold, while wearing not a stitch on him. His weight pinning him down is comforting in a way Merlin wouldn't have thought it'd be.

That smile is still on when Arthur palms Merlin's nape and brushes his nose against his. “Good morning.”

“Er, morning,” Merlin says. “How did we end up in bed? I remember...”

“Doing magic?” Arthur asks. “Me too. Definitely unforgettable. But don't tell me you forgot the second round? My honour is at stake; you're wounding me.”

Merlin's eyebrows go up as he draws a blank. “There was a round two?”

Arthur laughs. “No, idiot. After we were, you know--” The glow from a blush spreads across Arthur's cheeks. “After we were done you fell asleep where you were. I let you snooze on for a few minutes but we were on the floor, not quite comfortable as you can imagine, so I woke you, more or less, and you sleep-walked to bed.”

“Oh,” Merlin says. “That's why I don't remember that bit. Not because I've--”

“If you'd forgotten a would-be round two I wouldn't be talking to you,” Arthur says, walking his fingers down Merlin’s spine while his nose inches closer to Merlin's armpit. “I refuse to think I'm that forgettable.”

Merlin chuckles into the pillow. “No worries then. I just didn't know how we ended up here.”

Arthur sidles closer, almost climbing him like a creeper vine, and noses the back of Merlin's neck, the imprint of his lips warming Merlin up more than any blanket. “Well, you had a post coital melt down, because I'm that good, and then you did a lot of impressive magic. That must have been draining.”

Now that he thinks of it Merlin remembers rolling meadows being the setting for their tryst, golden skies, quite unnatural those, framing the experience. “My magic must have gone a bit haywire,” Merlin reflects aloud. “But it wasn't draining. I was keyed up. Sort of.”

Arthur kisses the top knob of his spine. “It was great. I liked seeing the... display. I'd do it all over again.”

“Only for the display?” Merlin asks, wiggling as Arthur runs his tongue over the knobs that stand out in relief in his back.

“No,” Arthur purrs. “I can do without the display.”

“Only do?”

Arthur stoops to kiss and lick at the line of his shoulders, at his throat, and at the shell of his ear, even as he reaches round to grip Merlin's filling prick. “I love you even without the pyrotechnics.”

Arthur says it like it's not a big deal, like it's one of their jokes, but liquid warmth unfurls inside Merlin. He gasps and he's not entirely sure it's Arthur's hand slowly tugging at his length that's doing it.

Arthur, however, is not being a slacker in that department either. He's running his hand back and forth down Merlin's cock, teasing the tip and picking up the droplets of precome oozing from the slit at its centre. “Y ddraig goch,” says Arthur, his hand never faltering.

“Arthur,” Merlin calls out and it's pretty much an invocation. Arthur can't be doing this to him now. “Arthur, no.”

“Why not?” Arthur asks, palming him, milking him. “I read Geoffrey. I read this other guy, too: Nennius. They say the red dragon wins over the white one. The white one is Aithusa, isn't it?”

Merlin sucks in a deep breath. “Where did you read that stuff?” Merlin groans.

Arthur smirks. “Library. Wars and battles are boring on paper so I consulted some more interesting books.”

“Arthur, they're stories,” Merlin manages to say even though it's as if all his world has shrunk to the pleasure radiating from his cock. “Just, uh, stories.”

“Based on you,” Arthur tells him. He strokes downwards with one hand hand, making Merlin's flesh go taut, then he brings his other hand to bear, wrapping it around him and sliding it up and down quickly enough to almost hurt. “The wisest wizard to ever live? A boy without a father? Like you?”

Merlin'd point out that he did have a father like everybody else, even if he only saw him twice and nobody could ever connect them, but that seems like a minor quibble compared with what Arthur's doing. “Arthur, why are we talking... ab... about this?”

“Because,” Arthur says in an I-know-better tone, “I want you to find your dragon.”

Oh, they're not doing this now, not when Arthur's pressing the pad of his thumb on the underside of Merlin's cock, circling round and round the more Merlin's breath quickens. “Aithusa's not mine,” Merlin says. “She-- she chose Morgana.”

Arthur pulls Merlin onto his back. “You're the dragonlord. Call her. Find her. Find out if there's others.”

Merlin's so close he isn't sure he's reasoning as he should. He stops this the only way he can. He tips them backwards so he's the one straddling Arthur. He stretches on top of him, pinning his hands down to the mattress so Arthur won't tease a promise he can't make out of him. His chest is rising and falling and his cock sticking out when he says, “Arthur, let's not.”

Arthur bucks his hips and it's a confident, lascivious and humorous gesture all at once. “Since you're there,” he says. Hinting at what he wants, Arthur spread his legs. 

“Okay,” Merlin says breathless as he imagines what having Arthur is going to be like. “I can do that.”

“Oh, now it's a concession.”

Not sure what game Arthur's playing, whether he's just promising so Merlin will yield, Merlin locks gazes with him and asks him, “Do you really, really want this?”

Arthur manages to nonchalantly roll his eyes even though he's as hard as Merlin is. “What does it look like?”

Merlin gulps. “It looks like you want me to...”

Arthur pushes up onto his elbows, reaches out for his face and snatches a kiss. It resounds loudly and it makes Merlin smile, especially since Arthur accompanies that with a rather sheepish face. “Yes. That's it. That's what I'd like.”

To do what Arthur wants, Merlin needs some help on the part of his magic. Unfortunately, he's never thought to get the necessary supplies because he would never have believed sex would happen between them. Thinking hard about the object he needs, he summons a bottle of massage oil, oil of the kind the knights would use for loosening bunched up muscles and for more recreational purposes as well. He knows it works because, unbeknownst of Gaius, he used it on himself. 

“Nifty magic,” Arthur says with a big, silly smile. “I never thought it would have that kind of use though.”

“Magic's beautiful that way,” Merlin says, not expecting to hear Arthur say, “And in many others.”

Arthur accepting his magic was once one of the biggest goals of Merlin's life. He'd lived hoping to hear the words and in a way he did, if too late in the game. Arthur going to the length of liking it, not simply condoning it, would have seemed impossible in his early years. The fact that Arthur's sounding as though he does appreciate magic is like joy and fulfilment all rolled into one. 

He lets his expression broaden into a smile, albeit a dazed one that's also powered by lust, and just lets himself gaze and gaze at Arthur.

Heart beating fast with a euphoric kind of joy, he brings slicked fingers to Arthur's hole and stretches him as gently as he can. 

As Arthur widens his legs and tips his head back against the mattress, Merlin presses the tip of his middle finger inside and, releasing a breath as if he were on the receiving hand himself, works it in, stopping at his first knuckle.

Arthur lets out a short gasp but it doesn't sound like a pained one. It's more like he's getting used to Merlin touching him. Rotating and corkscrewing his finger inside and around his rim, Merlin makes sure Arthur's ready. When he thinks he is he starts teasing his prostate, just so Arthur can get as worked up as Merlin is.

The blanket balls in his fingers and Arthur says his name in a pleading whisper.

That's when Merlin realises he's done enough and that more would be too much. With a hand that is actually none too sure, Merlin steadies Arthur's waist and slowly slips inside. 

Arthur's eyes widen and his throat works. He looks wrecked and surprised, wetting his lips. One of his hands leaves the sheets he's successfully twisted up in a knot and skims up Merlin's arm. “I hope I'm not supposed to do all the work now. I want to be...” He gasps as Merlin slips forward. “Royally lazy.”

Breath shuddering in his chest, Merlin moves, pressing in and then withdrawing slowly. Pace tentative, he looks to Arthur for confirmation that this is working for him. What he sees is Arthur's mouth dropping open, Arthur looking at him out of soft, fond, stunned eyes, an expression in them Merlin's seen there before though not quite like this. 

It warms him to the very core and he doesn't even know why.

His hips shifting and rolling, Merlin feels emotions rise up inside him that are stirred to a storm by the way Arthur's looking at him and by the sheer surge of physical well being that sliding inside Arthur, cradled by his body, engenders in him. 

Arthur's reaction to him, one that isn't cavalier or jokey, but rather honest, is really turning him into one big puddle of feelings. If he weren't on a bed he'd probably crumble. His strokes less than smooth, a little jerky, a little stuttering, he seeks a pace that will be right for Arthur.

Arthur's eyes go soft and full of affection and Merlin's never felt so cherished before. His body is taking Merlin in without restraint. Arthur's grasping Merlin's shoulders with trembling fingers, wrapping his legs around them with a strength Merlin knows from watching Arthur through the years, dragging his fingers up and down his back, digging his nails in Merlin's flesh.

A moan moves up Merlin's throat. They rock together, their tempo gradually becoming faster and increasingly urgent. With each thrust, Merlin's nears the edge, close to toppling headlong over it. 

That's the moment Arthur chooses to grab the side of his face and say in a voice that is all shards of glass, “I just want you to be everything that--” Arthur's face scrunches up, hopefully in pleasure, before he finishes, “that you are.” 

After that they both get too incoherent with pleasure to comment much. Arthur strips himself, come getting to coat his chest while Merlin slams in, holds his hips, and ends up shivering into orgasm.

When they're done and Merlin topples over Arthur, Arthur pulls his lips hard into his mouth. “Hi,” he says.

Merlin can't really work up the energy to argue with Arthur about his tactics. He just snuggles next to him, stroking his side with his fingertips.

The subject – here be dragons – doesn't come up again over the next week though Arthur isn't subtle about it either. He leaves books about dragon lore open on all surfaces and starts talking about mythical beasts like it's a normal topic. “Did you know that according to European folklore lyndwurms are just like wyverns? Can you command those too?”

Merlin mostly shuts him up with slow kisses and meaningful touches. He does it partly because it's a nice conversation stopper and partly because Arthur's there for him and Merlin loves him so he can't keep from giving in to physical expressions of his feelings. They have more sex than Merlin's ever had.

And it's good. Not just because of the pleasure but because he can't quite wipe the grin from his face, he's so on the moon. He walks about humming under his breath, trying spells and attempting to entertain Arthur with his magic, revelling in how much Arthur seems to like that part of him now.

If Gaius were here he'd say Merlin's reverted to his teenage years. As he thinks about what Gaius would say no pang of loss comes; a warm glow of remembrance envelopes him instead and he's quite content with making fun of himself to himself in the words of his old mentor. 

Merlin spends the better part of his days in the garden, trying to make it look nicer. He's always loved nature and though he's never had an especially active green thumb, he's always enjoyed spending time in the open. Still, the absence of any nurturing skill in his genetic make-up makes reviving the garden a less than easy task. So when he gets disgruntled over the obstinacy of weeds he just uses his magic to will flowers and fruit into being.

“That's cheating,” Arthur says as he barges in on Merlin's travails. “Nice cornflowers, but still cheating.”

“But now the garden's definitely prettier,” Merlin says, waving his weeder about. “Look around.”

“Still cheating.” For a moment Merlin's sure that Arthur's repeated his former words using a falsetto tone. He'd be entirely capable of it. Arthur loves teasing. But then Merlin turns towards the shrub he means to prune to find a pixie hiding amid the foliage. He understands that it wasn't Arthur who said that.

Taken aback, Merlin falls backwards onto his arse, spluttering. “And whoever asked your opinion or summoned you for that matter?”

Probably thinking that Merlin's gone mad and is talking to himself, Arthur comes over to investigate.

He doesn't tense when he sees the little creature revelling in greenery, though he points and asks, “What's that?”

“A pixie,” Merlin says. “I haven't seen one in... The first Queen Elisabeth was on the throne.”

He remembers the encounter quite well; the other witness to it was a gentleman poet who turned out to be Edmund Spencer. Merlin's never felt more second hand embarrassment as when reading his bloody allegory.

As Merlin reminisces, the pixie climbs on top of the shrub it burrowed into and gives a cute little bow that would have done an Elizabethan poet proud. “Hail, Emrys,” it says. “You summoned me. I was born yesterday and heeded your call.”

Merlin's never been able to understand fairies, Mab a case in point. This one is making even less sense than Mab usually does. “I didn't. I'd remember if I'd called you.”

The pixie wrinkles its tiny nose. “You're rude, my lord, denying your own doings, but I shall be polite. Queen Una sends her greetings.”

Arthur looks confused. “I thought... I thought the reigning Queen had another name.”

Merlin, unfortunately, has heard the name before. “The mythical Queen of Fairyland,” he chokes out.

The pixie seems insulted by Merlin's choice of words. “Not mythical. No more than the great Emrys.”

Merlin opens his mouth to argue but the pixie, in pixie fashion, won't let him. “Well, I see you're quite contrary.” The pixie disappears with a pop but its voice lingers behind. “I'll come back when you're more amenable.”

Arthur bursts out laughing at Merlin's discomfited face. Merlin pouts all day, muttering that he's not contrary.

After the pixie encounter Merlin leaves the garden be and focuses on Arthur and his continued crash course into modernity. There's always more to explore when you've missed the last fifteen hundred years and every day brings a new challenge for Arthur. While some of them are easy, some are not.

However Arthur's now seems to be taking everything head on. Gadgetry – well, almost all gadgetry – no longer baffles him. He learns to drive, being the scourge of lamp posts and rubbish disposal containers dotted along Merlin's street, and he starts taking an interest in politics and history. He claims never to want to get back to ruling, but that he wishes to stay informed. “I want to be a conscientious voter.”

Everything seems to be slotting into perfect normality for them, or as far as Merlin's life can be normal considering he's an immortal warlock serving the Once and Future King, into something closely resembling it.

In spite of that it's around this time that Merlin's magic starts flaring up like never before. It's like he's walking through static and he finds himself using his powers subconsciously more than ever, including that phase of his childhood when his magic would surface unbidden to satisfy his most primal desires. (Basically: food, play, mum.) Air shifts around him as he moves and everything starts looking different. His garden blooms; his house takes to looking prettier by itself though the furniture doesn't change nor do they do any work on its structure.

It's just that old appliances decide to work smoothly all of a sudden and ratty objects begin to look new when they're really old, sometimes ancient,

He's just trying the sofa, the upholstery padding suddenly no longer lumpy, when someone rings his doorbell.

Not to alarm whoever is on the other side and used to the grumpy and aged owner of this house, Merlin changes into the old man that people expect see when they knock on his door. He needn't have bothered. He doesn't know the person on his doorstep.

It's a girl in her very early twenties, dark hair that tumble past her shoulders whipping in the wind. “Emrys,” she says. “Tell me you're Emrys. The voices led me to you.”


	14. Chapter 14

Arthur is watching TV, indulging in his new-found love for this sport called rugby, hands laced behind his neck, legs lazily stretched out in front of him, when the doorbell rings. 

At first he doesn't go and check up because Merlin's got it and he's certainly the more acclimated of the two of them when it comes to talking to modern people. (And the doorbell still puts him out enough that he never manages to produce a non grumpy face to greet any new arrival.) But then he sees Merlin, looking like Emrys, and an unknown girl trail into the kitchen.

That stops him. It's not so much because of the fact itself but because he doesn't recognise the girl. She's not a neighbour and not even the lady from that association protecting the elderly that keeps popping up to convince Merlin to subscribe to the group she so dutifully promotes.

An eyebrow quirked, he wanders into the kitchen and, as soon as he does, the girl, who's now sitting around the table across from Merlin, stops talking.

Merlin spreads his hands out. “You can talk in front of Arthur. He's my friend.”

The girl scrutinises him out of hostile eyes. “I-- I don't know if I should.”

Arthur's meditating backing out despite his curiosity, when Merlin says, “I trust Arthur and if you've come here it's because you trust...”

She scoffs. “The voices in my head? I don't even know if I'm crazy.”

Merlin shakes his head. “I was going to say me but now I'll say this; you're not crazy.”

“So you are Emrys?”

He nods wisely.

The girl does the same in return. "Yes, you could say I also go by that name."

"Then, if the voices are right, we're in for a long talk."

Merlin rises and claps his hands together. “Why don't I make you some tea? You can tell me what brought you here over a cuppa.”

The girl slumps back in her chair. “All right,” she says. “Let's begin with better introductions. My name's Nyniane.”

Hiding behind a steaming cup of tea Nyniane doesn't drink from from but clutches at, she starts her tale. “It all started a week ago. One moment everything was normal just like it had always been and the next I was doing odd things.”

“What odd things?” Merlin asks benignly, sounding like an understanding grandfather for all he's worth. Arthur knows what it is he's suspecting but has to give it to him: Merlin's leaving room for the girl to give any kind of reply she wants, putting her at her ease.

Nyniane bites her lip. “You won't believe me.” 

“Try me.”

Niniane's eyes flash and for a moment Arthur's not sure if that was a normal anger spark caught and highlighted by the kitchen's artificial illumination or if her eyes changed colour like Merlin's do.

“I'm doing things,” she says. “With my mind. I want something? That object literally flies into my hand. I'm angry? Crockery explodes. And then...”

Merlin nudges her on. “And then?”

“Then I started hearing voices,” Nyniane says. “Telling me to find Emrys. And I saw snatches of locations. Leading me here. The voices would only shut up when I started working my way here, but... Maybe I'm just crazy.”

Merlin denies that and Arthur thinks he knows why. “You're not crazy,” Merlin says. 

“I don't know,” Nyniane says, finally taking a sip of her tea even if it must have gone cold. “My granddad was a doctor. He'd say I was.”

A hazy halo surrounding him, Merlin changes back into his young self. The girl will now either faint or stop questioning her sanity. She does neither. Pushing her chair back, she stumbles upright. “You were old.”

“I can assure you I am old,” Merlin says. “And I'm also magic. You're not going mad.”

Nyniane is now grasping the counter. “I think I just hallucinated.”

“I think you just have magic,” Merlin says. “Like me.”

“Then you're mad too!”

Arthur intervenes. Even though he has no understanding of what it means to be magical, he can supply proof. “He's magic. I saw him change. I'm not mad. What are the odds of two people seeing the same things?”

Nyniane seems to see Arthur's point for her shoulders bend out of their former rigid posture. “So I have what? Telekinesis? Some weird Uri Geller type power?”

“Magic,” Merlin says. “Natural magic. It's rare but not... unheard of. It's who you are.”

“Who I am?” Nyniane asks doubtfully.

“It's a part of who you are just as much as your hair colour or your feelings,” Merlin explains, making Arthur see the truth in his words just as much as he is doing it for the girl's benefit. “There's nothing wrong with you.”

“But I can't control it,” Nyniane says. “It does what it wants when I don't want it!”

“I can teach you,” Merlin offers, reaching a hand out. “It'll take time but if you want to...”

“I have a job,” Nyniane says, clearly alarmed by the thought of the upheaval that magic's going to cause to her life. “Things to do. A life.”

“You don't have to train twenty-four seven.” Merlin gives her an uplifting grin. “But from time to time. When you want to. Just so you can control what you're doing.”

Nyniane lets out a loud breath that sounds a bit harassed. She wrings her hands. “I don't know.”

“Just so you don't unknowingly harm people with your powers.”

Nyniane bows her head, her hair shielding her from their view. Head still bent she says, “Okay, all right. I don't want to hurt anyone in a freak accident. Please, help me.”

After she leaves Merlin gets pensive while he pretends to be washing the mugs they used. Arthur wants to manhandle him into an embrace but knows that the method won't work. Yet, short of employing force to get Merlin to tell him what's wrong, he doesn't know how to act. Sex is one thing, being mushy another. Gwen would be better suited to do this. Since he's the one needing to help Merlin, he opts for asking a question, “Why are you feeling down?”

“I'm not,” Merlin says, skimming his fingers across a layer of soap suds. “It's just that Nyniane reminded me of Morgana.” He pauses, his lashes going down as if he doesn't want Arthur to make out his expression. “And of myself a little bit. Her not knowing who she is did the trick.”

“Merlin,” Arthur says, “she's just scared.”

“Like Morgana was,” Merlin says. “In the beginning. And I failed Morgana.”

Arthur sighs. “I failed her first.”

“We both did,” Merlin says. “But that's beside the point. I'm afraid I'll make more mistakes.”

“But I made you make those,” Arthur points out. Looking back, he's sure that if he hadn't listened to his father, if he'd let himself see as he had when it was too late, then maybe Morgana would have chosen another way. They could have been brother and sister instead of the bitter enemies they became. Her death put a stop to the war and Arthur was glad for the peace it brought but it should never have got there. “If I'd made magic legal...”

Merlin places his wet hand on top of his even though his gaze is still directed at the sink. “By the time you got the throne, she already hated us all. I'm the one who could have prevented everything -- probably. Never found out how though.”

“You can help this new girl, though,” Arthur says, needing to let bygones be bygones. The thought of Morgana still brings a pang with it he's not sure he's ready to face without succumbing to either self-pity, rage, or sympathy for her initial plight. None of which feelings will ever help putting the past to rights.

“As long as she doesn't end up thinking she's a monster,” Merlin says, sniffling and then wiping at his nose with the back of his hand. 

Arthur has to hide a full body wince at Merlin's way of linking magic to monstrosity. It's suggestive of a mentality that reminds Arthur of his father. “Did you think that? Ever?”

“At times,” Merlin admits, face scrunched up in a botch of lines that signal his distaste of the subject. “Not always. And Gaius... Gaius said I wasn't and I believed him.”

Arthur's eyes roam over Merlin with a measure of anxiety. He shifts, backtracks, then takes Merlin in his arms using more strength than he should have. It ends up being less of a hug and more of a contortion of bodies, at least until Merlin breathes out and stops fighting him. “You're not, you know.”

Merlin leans his chin on Arthur's shoulder and bunches the material of Arthur's shirt into crazy folds. “I guess I'm better looking than your average basilisk.” He exhales loudly, in a sort of vibrato that makes his ribcage shake. “But you were afraid of me after you found out.”

“I wasn't!” Arthur says, in his stiff King-of-Camelot tone. Then he adds more staunchly, “I'm not.”

A few days later Nyniane sends Merlin one of those text messages that make Merlin's phone vibrate like an ailing boar. She wants to see him again so she can learn to 'deal'. Over the following weeks their meetings become a thing and Merlin seems not to worry about his pupil anymore, she can bridle her magic fine now, though he starts worrying about the other happenings taking place around him.

At first Arthur doesn't notice himself but after a while he, too, sees. And that's saying something because he's not, strictly speaking, attuned to magic. Yet it would be impossible to ignore that more and more people start displaying signs of magical ability. 

The little girl in the park turning her cat pink is a case in point as are the plumber repairing leaking tubes by cursing at them -- he ends up on one of those reality show thingys Arthur can't get the hang of -- or the talking fish appearing in a random pond.

One morning at around three, Arthur finds Merlin at the kitchen table, busy browsing a bound tome of the kind Arthur remembers seeing in Camelot. It's not like the books they sell now in those shops where you can browse and paw the merchandise for free, cups of coffee in hand; those tiny things with cardboard covers that get wrinkly and spines that crack. It's a proper leather bound folio edition that's got hand-drawn miniatures for illustrations.

When Arthur steps into the room, Merlin slams the book shut, then laughs a little in relief and a little like Arthur scared him. “Sorry,” he says, “force of habit.”

Arthur straddles the chair opposite Merlin's, putting his chin on its back. “Force of habit?”

Merlin smiles to himself. “You don't know how many times I hid this book from you. I used to stash it under a floorboard in my room. Gaius let me have it after I left Camelot, even if it was his originally. He said it was more use to me because I was more powerful.”

Arthur can see how that was one of Gaius' books. It most definitely looks like one of those dusty volumes Gaius used to line up his shelves with. “So it's a magic book.”

“Yeah,” Merlin says sheepishly.

“And what were you looking for in that magic book of yours?” Arthur has an inkling but he wants Merlin to be open and honest about it.

“Estranged dragons,” Merlin says almost too swiftly to catch the words. “Magic resurgence cycles.”

Arthur doesn't know which topic to give precedence. Both seem important to him. “You think that's what's happening? Nyniane and the little girl and the creatures popping up in strange places?”

“Probably,” Merlin says. “Druids believed there were cycles like that. That's why Stonehenge was built.”

“You don't sound too sure,” Arthur points out. Merlin's worrying his lip and smoothing his palm across the page he's selected again and again. That doesn't scream confidence to him. 

“That's because I don't think I've ever witnessed one.” One of Merlin's eyebrows shoots up. “Or anything but a steady-ish decline ever since... Well, since the high priestesses died out. The last one was Morgana.”

Arthur closes his fist around the chair's arm. “I see.”

“Since Alator the Catha and Finna and Kilgharrah,” Merlin trails off. “Magic's been waning, not coming back in cycles.”

“But now it's not,” Arthur says. “Now it's spiking. Aren't you happy?”

Merlin's breath rattles out expansively. “Yeah, yeah. I just need to find a way to protect it. Them. The people with magic.”

Arthur was a king once. He can foresee consequences, predict policies as well as the behaviours of large groups of people. “You're afraid of more purges?”

Merlin shakes his head. “A few centuries ago I would've. Now I'm more afraid of science and greed. But I think that's a risk I'm going to have to run, like anyone with magic, if I want it fully back. And I do. I never liked seeing it die.”

Arthur can see that the wrinkles lining Merlin's forehead and the area around his mouth haven't relaxed. “You're still concerned though.”

“I can feel my magic buzzing madly and there's some things I can't ignore.”

Merlin takes to scrutinising the table top, for what Arthur doesn't know. “Aithusa,” he guesses at last. “You want to find her.”

Merlin bobs his head in assent. 

Arthur gets to his feet. “Then let's go pack up. We'll go on a quest for her.”

Merlin's head snaps up. “Arthur, no!”

Not liking Merlin's refusal, Arthur sticks his chin out. “Why not?”

“Because I don't know if I can trust her,” Merlin says. “Because she's a grown dragon now and dangerous. Because she got you killed when she was a baby, think what she could do now. And I'm not letting you die.”

Arthur shouts. He wasn't planning to before beginning this conversation but he'll be damned before he'll let anyone talk to him like that, like he's defenceless, a babe in arms, stupid and useless. He may be no king anymore but he's most certainly not that. His brow furrows; his cheeks puff out and heat. “I'll do what I please!”

“You can't come with me,” Merlin insists, voice going down several notches. “There's limits to what you can do.”

“No, there's not!” Arthur says, though it's true he can't do magic. That doesn't mean he isn't trained to face danger or qualified to protect Merlin. “I'm a grown up man and a warrior. I won't let you order me about.”

Maybe he's put emphasis on the wrong things, but most of that still holds true.

Merlin looks the other way. “Because you're a king?” Merlin scoffs.

“Because I'll bloody well do what I want!” Arthur says, unchaining all his rebelliousness. “I'm not your puppet and I'm not a plaything. I thought you respected me enough to see that. But it seems not.”

And that hurts. It hurts more than anything has in his life; this thought that Merlin doesn't hold him high in his esteem. For all his barking, he's never, not for one moment, thought that Merlin wasn't brave or that he wasn't the man he wanted at his side in case of need. Not just for Camelot, but for himself. He'd have sought none other than Merlin. Knowing that the feeling's not mutual more than stings. He can hold his head high in the face of it but the truth is that it makes a mockery of all that he feels for Merlin and that's a whole lot. What is he to him? He'd like to know. 

Merlin shakes his head. “You just can't see.”

“See what!” Arthur shouts. “That you'll happily risk your life...”

“Immortal,” Merlin grumbles under his breath.

“You didn't know that at first though, did you, so you're still a hypocrite,” Arthur rages on, heartbeat rate climbing, ears ringing to the rhythm of his own fury. “You'll walk into danger and tell me to keep out of it with a straight face? Either we're in this together or not at all.” He doesn't know whether he's just ended things with Merlin, he was't trying to go there and his heart is already cracking at the thought, but he can't see how to retract and more importantly he doesn't want to. Not unless Merlin tells him that he's never for a minute thought Arthur incapable of standing strong by his side.

At the threat Merlin's body language stays the same – stiff and closed off. Since he's keeping his eyes averted Arthur can read but a fraction of the expression in them. Merlin's eyes have always told the tale of his real feelings but now Arthur can't even make them out, can't search for a shade or compunction or regret in him. All he can see are hard lines and a severe frown caught sideways. Merlin's fist is gathered inwards and his frame is shaking with what Arthur takes to be barely suppressed anger. But there's nothing else. “Fine,” Merlin rasps, his voice so different Arthur barely recognises it. “Then it's not at all because I'm going alone.”

“Fine! Arthur finds himself yelling and since he can't stay and watch Merlin be like this – cold and is inscrutable -- he stomps off and holes himself in Merlin's room, slamming the door and turning the key in the lock.

He expects Merlin to lay siege to the door or apologise and backtrack. He expects Merlin to say that they're not done in pleading tones. Merlin's always the one for reconciling. Merlin with his stupid grins and penchant for flowers. But that doesn't happen. And it's not as if he could have missed Merlin doing any of that for he doesn't sleep a wink – rather paces loudly enough to alert the world to his wakefulness. And though he has an eye out for any peace offering that might be coming for Merlin, none materialises.

He waits but Merlin doesn't deign to appear or do anything that Arthur feels would be typical for him to do. Still, he doesn't go down himself. Can't. The echo of Merlin's words makes a flush appear on his face each time he dwells on them and he just can't bring himself to.

By dawn, however, he has cooled down enough to peek out of his room. But there's no trace of Merlin anywhere. His spell book is gone.

Arthur swipes a hand across his brow, kicks at the kitchen table's leg, and curses.


	15. Chapter 15

Sunlight hasn't cleared the horizon or lit up the sky yet when Merlin leaves his home. He's got a rucksack full of provisions and a change of clothes strapped to his back; he's also taken his sidhe staff with him, though he glamours it to look like a walking cane.

As he makes his way to the station and boards a train for Exmoor – he needs a lot of space to summon a dragon in a world where dwellings always cluster close – thoughts of his row with Arthur, which he blocked off during his preparations for the trip, surface again.

He couldn't have done this any differently, he reflects as he leans his head against the train's window, the landscape whisking past in a blur he doesn't linger on. He can live apart from Arthur knowing that he is fine. 

Arthur will be. He's learnt the basics of living in the present decade and can easily pick up the rest as he goes. But he can't live with him dying again, with no promise of a return. Without that hope Merlin doesn't think he could make it.

He's lost Arthur once; twice would undo him. He's walked close to the brink too many times and he's not proud of it. Skirting the abyss was at one time a habit of his. But now that he's felt all this joy rush back into his life, he doesn't think he could face a second loss. He doesn't even want to think about the possibility of it.

Better to live without Arthur in his life while knowing he's out there, prospering, than to see him being taken again.

He won't look into his eyes as the light is snuffed out of them again. He won't.

He's made the only possible decision. He has.

The train journey isn't a long one and soon he is coasting a country road snaking round Exmoor National Park. When vegetation starts taking over civilisation, wind swept moors unfolding before his eyes as they tumble on and on towards the sea, he leaves the road and plunges into the heart of nature.

The trek isn't hard on him. He's pretty used to walking to get where he wants to be. It's not as if he was born in the age of engines and public transport. Even horses were a commodity he started regularly making use of only after he became the prince's manservant. As a matter of fact he got to Camelot on foot, spacing up the various legs of the journey and resting when he felt tired or when the soles of his feet started blistering. After Camlann, after a few decades spent pitted as a sentry by the lake, he wandered forests and roamed the countryside, mostly making do once again without horses. He even reached Caledonia on his own steam once.

The idea of wandering sorcerers wasn't a Romantic fad.

So he's quite ready to plod along the peaty terrain as his body cuts through swathes of fog. He doesn't mind the ground rising or falling or the bleak desolation of the land he's penetrating. He sets a pace he can keep up with without getting winded and his newly young legs do all the work for him.

When he estimates he's far enough from civilisation to make the summoning of a dragon go unnoticed, he unburdens himself, setting his rucksack and staff at his feet, and looks up at the grey sky.

He doesn't think he's ready. It's been so long since he last tapped into this side of him that he's not even sure it's still there. The dragonlord is a part of him that seems to belong to the past. After Kilgharrah passed, that part became something that he buried deep inside him, an aspect of him that he connected to his father and his dragon, both of whom were gone.

As a protection mechanism he learnt how not to let his thoughts linger on them. How to compartmentalise and live a day to day life that would go by without him having to recall any of that. It was easy if not particularly brave of him.

But he has to mend things and bridge the gap now. He's left it too long already and his magic surging is making it impossible for him to ignore his legacy. Not to mention the fact that moral burden he is the one pledged to carry as the last of his kind is making itself felt.

Throwing his head back and swallowing, he closes his eyes and finds his centre.

“O drakon,” he shouts at the heavens, the words rusty and strange on his tongue. They sound foreign and not as instinctive as they used to be.

When after a while he hears no flapping of powerful wings, he blinks his eyes open it's to see an horizon free of anything but clouds. There's certainly no dragon making her way to him. 

He sinks on his knees, the buzz of emotion and anticipation that's been secretly travelling under his skin since starting this mission dissolving.

What's happened? Why isn't she coming? 

Does she hate him? Has she found other shores?

Perhaps she too is gone like the rest of his past. Perhaps he'll never be able to make it right with her. Perhaps the time for that is long gone. That's when it sinks in; for all his distrust and rage at her following Arthur's death, he's always thought that she was out there and fine. What could harm a dragon? But he's sure now that something has and a new realisation sinks in. He's going to miss her like a part of him that's been ripped off. She is, too, isn't she? A part of him. He called her, caused her to be born, and now xhe isn't there to respond to this second summoning.

He presses at his eyes with the palms of his hands then scrunches his fists as he folds down, putting his head to his knee. “I've done it all wrong, Father,” he says. “I didn't do right by my kind.”

He bites at the fabric of his trousers so as to latch onto something as he would if he had to brace for pain, so he's not expecting to hear his father's soothing voice.

“You are bonded, Merlin. Never forget the bond.”

It's been such a long time since Merlin heard from his father, Merlin jerks his head up instinctively. He can't see him but he can feel his presence and, in a way, his love. “How?” he demands.

“You and your dragon are one,” Balinor says.

That's the last he hears from his father no matter how many questions he fires at the sky or how many times he repeats that he misses him. ('Please, talk to me.') 

Voice thick with exhaustion and sadness, he at last decides not to linger on his missing his father. He won't accomplish anything if he does and Balinor wouldn't be proud of him for betraying Aithusa further. Instead he does he's been told.

He searches for the dragon within him.


	16. Chapter 16

Alone, Arthur roams the house, a space that's spare and to which not much attention has been devoted and that's yet got Merlin written across it in the way it resembles Merlin's former Camelot lodgings, and wonders how things could have gone wrong so fast.

He tries to hold on to his grudge and decide on a course of action. His options are leaving, waiting for Merlin to come back and then leaving in high dudgeon, and staying to fight for what he's got. 

He sinks into a chair and, hand to his forehead, starts staring ahead. 

Somehow things seemed easier when he was about to die than they are now. His focus then was on Merlin and saying how sorry and thankful he was within the time limit set to him by his own failing body. In the hours leading up to his death he learnt to put by his pride and accept Merlin wholly, forgiving Merlin's shortcomings in the face of his newly revealed greatness. But now it seems so difficult to achieve the same state of mind.

But even with indignation prickling at his skin, thoughts of Merlin crowd in on him. He can't get him out of his mind or help wondering where he is. He must be worrying about his dragon and thinking that he's screwed up his chances with it.

If there's something that Arthur's learnt it's that Merlin leaves and breathes magic. The situation must be harrowing for him. Especially with magic now soaring withing him and compelling him to face his origins as a dragonlord.

It gets even worse when the cat Merlin occasionally feeds slinks into the kitchen from god knows where, evidently looking for Merlin. 

It's such a small thing, the cat meowing for the hand that usually feeds it, but it does make Arthur wonder what Merlin's up to right in this moment, whether he's found his dragon yet, whether the dragon is all right or Morgana corrupted her.

It's been a few hours since Merlin's left. He must have found out by now.

The cat sits on its haunches, head held high, and mewls loudly.

“You want breakfast?” Arthur asks.

The cat pushes its head against Arthur's leg. Since Merlin does it too whenever the cat shows up, he reaches down and scratches it on its head, feeling the soft fur beneath his fingertips. The cat makes a noise. “What does Merlin usually give you?” he asks, looking around for a bowl and food that might not be harmful to the cat's intestinal tract. 

He spots something that might pass on the counter and makes his way there. His attention however is diverted by a scrap of paper sitting right next to yesterday's plate of Danish meatballs. It's something that's been freshly printed, Arthur can tell, because the ink smudges off when Arthur picks it up.

(He has one or two tales to tell about his misadventures with Merlin's printer but he owes something to them. Now he's at least learnt a few things about how it works and how it leaves stains he would have otherwise ignored.

The print is small but he can definitely make out what it is that he's reading. Merlin's explained the ins and outs of railway bookings to him, but a few weeks before, so the memory's relatively fresh. So he knows that what he's seeing is a train schedule complete with journey details. For some reason Merlin's interested in the trains running between Castle Cary, the nearest station, and Newton St Cyr. 

Arthur can only presume that that's where Merlin's headed. Pocketing the slip of paper he goes to find Merlin's atlas. His own sense of geography still heavily relies on old names so he's not sure he understands where Merlin's wending his way in actual fact. Names don't often ring a bell with him nowadays though the shape of a valley or the meanderings of a river will help give him a sense of direction more than any place name.

When he's got the atlas open, he consults the index and finds Merlin's destination point on a grille. He then compares it to a map of the South West and finds out that Merlin is probably travelling towards the Exmoor National Park. 

That makes sense. If his plan was calling the dragon to him then he couldn't have done it from the back-garden.

Because a dragon is huge, noticeable, and possibly dangerous. At least an estranged dragon could be.

And Merlin's out there with one. 

Arthur knows he oughtn't worry. Merlin's lived this long and he's immortal. Arthur, though, has never questioned the terms of his immortality and now wonders whether Merlin just goes on and on but would die if injured or whether he's impervious to wounds and accidents too. His immortality alone should guarantee his physical safety but Arthur can't be completely positive that's the case as long as there's room for doubt. And he's never sat Merlin down and asked him to explain that one. 

It would have seemed like prying.

Yet Merlin's powerful and likely unbreakable. He's going to be fine. 

Emotionally, though...

Merlin's stray climbs into Merlin's armchair, the old one Merlin's claimed to have had for ages, and licks at the paw it's got sticking straight out for the purpose. 

“You think he's not fine?” Arthur addresses the cat. 

The cat answers by way of a high pitched, growly meow.

“Maybe he's not,” Arthur says. Dread sinks in and before it can fully lodge into his chest he dashes into the shower and then into fresh clothes. 

Still prey to the same bad feeling, he bikes to the station, buys a ticket from the machine as Merlin's taught him to, and manages to board the right train a handful of seconds before it leaves.

Train journey over, map spread on the handlebars, he cycles towards more open country, but once he finds himself in the middle of nowhere, wetlands everywhere around him, he realises that finding Merlin would be like finding a needle in a haystack. The area is too large for him to cover and Merlin's just one man. 

Instinct has brought him so far but he's also come to an impasse.

He wagers that if he waits here he might be able to sight any dragon planing down – at least if his hunch as to Merlin being here was correct in the first place. Yet he's not a winged creature himself. This means that even if he did see the dragon he wouldn't be able to reach it and Merlin in time -- however hard he pedalled.

Cursing under his breath, Arthur strikes the handlebar with a knotted fist. “Damn,” he says. “Where have you got to?”

“Sometimes looking isn't done with the eyes,” a voice says before a shape coalesces right in front of Arthur. 

It's a man. A man with long long black hair greying here and there, bushy eyebrows, and wearing proper clothes, i.e., the kind that Arthur recognises as such as opposed to the garments people from nowadays seem to prefer to sturdy tunics and trousers that are actually good for hunting and fighting in. It's also someone Arthur's seen before, if only once and for a brief time. “You're the dragonlord,” Arthur says. “You're Balinor, Merlin's father.”

“I am,” Balinor says. “His spirit, if you will.”

“I need to find Merlin,” says Arthur. “He's... I think he needs someone by his side.”

“He does,” Balinor says. “There's danger lurking for him.”

Arthur knew of this before setting out. He just knew it. He'd worry about having premonitions like Morgana but there's more pressing matters to attend. “What kind of danger?”

“A dragon may hurt its dragonlord in more ways than one,” Balinor says. “If Merlin finds his dragon, that is.”

“And how do I find Merlin?” 

Balinor fizzes in and out as Merlin's TV does when he's got bad reception. “I'll show you the way.”

The way that happens is not something that Arthur's ever experienced before. There's no one physically showing him anything. It's as if images are being planted in his head and he can see the path ahead before he even starts following it. He pedals like mad, happy that he's had the foresight to learn how to do this, while his brain is zapped with flashes of his itinerary. 

He's not sure how long it takes him to get where he needs to be, but the sun is past its zenith when he does. He's a knoll away from Merlin, when he sees him looking tiny next to a big white dragon with pale eyes that's looming over him. With wings outspread, one of which is crooked, Aithusa looks like something's wrong with her. She's also dwarfing Merlin.

Head tipped back, Merlin is talking to her half in the dragon idiom, which sounds like complete gibberish to Arthur, half in English. He sounds upset, sad, concerned and on the brink of shouting in both.

Balinor reappears at his side. “The Dragon is mad with grief,” says Balinor. “She's dangerous but it's a danger Merlin can face if he starts believing in himself.”

Knowing Merlin, that isn't likely right now because Arthur knows Merlin's feeling guilty towards the dragon. Merlin seems pretty sure of his magical abilities but he's not always sure about the rightness of his choices. “What if he won't?” Arthur asks. 

He's dreading the answer but when it comes it isn't too terrible. “Then you'll help him. You and him are two sides of the same whole. You'll restore the balance of magic and--”

“Non magic?” Arthur says, understanding he has no way to help if not by way of a show of support.

“Only partly,” says Balinor. “You may have none yourself but you were born of magic, Arthur Pendragon. That's why you and Merlin are part of that whole. You fit. And that's why destiny's made you special. It has made you the only one able to give the earth what it wants, her rightful balance.”

“Restoring magic?”

Balinor nods slowly. “And dragons. The balance. Till the cycle is perfected.”

Arthur would ask more if things weren't getting flukey fast.

Aithusa is emitting high pitched cries like those of a bird of prey and Merlin's now roaring. The situation is clearly getting out of hand.

Forgetting about his guide, Arthur dismounts from his bicycle and starts running up the knoll and towards Merlin, shouting his name.

Merlin turns and his eyes flash even in the distance. “Arthur, back off. I think she's gone mad.”

As if to confirm Merlin's words, Aithusa spits fire at Merlin. To Arthur's relief, Merlin manages to summon some kind of invisible shield to protect himself and the flames are redirected to its sides. It's incredible. Flames shouldn't even behave that way, bouncing off to the sides as they do, and yet Merlin's just bent the laws of nature. As much as he wants to gawp at that, he knows there's no time for it.

He can marvel later.

“You have to reach out to her,” Arthur says, sprinting over to Merlin. Flames or no flames his place is there, by Merlin's side. “You have to believe you're capable of doing that.”

“I've been trying,” Merlin says. “She can't talk. She seems not to understand me.”

Arthur negotiates the last rise in the ground and has almost reached Merlin, when the dragon spooks and seems to decide that Arthur's a threat. Dragons tend to roast humans they perceive as such and this one is no exception. Aithusa has tried killing Arthur before and Arthur has been fast enough to duck on those occasions. So that's what he does. He rolls and picks himself up before Aithusa can open her snowy-white snout again.

That gives Merlin time to shield him too. “Arthur,” he hisses, “go back.”

“No,” says Arthur, “we stand together.”

“Not if you're deep fried, we don't.”

“I think I know what to do,” Arthur hisses over a new burst of flame that, shield notwithstanding, nearly singes his skin. “You have to stop feeling guilty, Merlin.” So far he's only re-elaborating Balinor's words but then he understands them. “She has to trust you. And how can she if you don't do it yourself?”

Meanwhile Aithusa grows more and more restless, screeching in little short jabs, flapping her wings, and enveloping Arthur and Merlin in a larger sheet of fire. 

Arthur can see that Merlin's having a hard time keeping his shield up for some reason. Maybe it's because he's upset or perhaps because he doesn't really want to counter-blast or punish Aithusa. 

However that is, just as Arthur's trying to convey what he means, Merlin drops part of his shield so he can better cover Arthur. His sleeve as well as his arm catches on fire.

Merlin screams and Arthur leaps over to him, not caring if he dies this time too. He's learnt how to die and he's not afraid. He was more afraid before Camlann than he is now. 

No wall of fire hits him though, even if the sound of Merlin's pain does. It tears at him even he attempts to stop it at its source. Trying not to let panic overtake him, he flings himself at Merlin, throwing him down to the ground and rolling on top of him as he pats the fanning flames out.

Merlin gives another pained sob that wrenches Arthur's heart out of his ribcage and then shivers himself into a quiet stance.

The moment's Merlin's stopped moving, Arthur takes in the damage.

His fabric that went into shaping his sleeve is half melted into reddened blistered skin that's swelling fast. The first layer of it is beginning to crackle and break into welts before his eyes. Arthur doesn't know how bad the burn is or how lethal. He doesn't even know whether dragon's breath has magical killing properties. Merlin's immortal but can he withstand dragon fire? If dragon's breath tempering a sword is enough to fashion a deadly weapon that not even magic can oppose, what else can it do?

As these thoughts whirl into his brain he has no thought for the dragon or the danger he's in, but only for Merlin. Merlin who's alternately whimpering softly and groaning, tears escaping from closed eyes, his breath coming short and laboured.

Arthur cradles him in his lap, half covering him with his body in case more fire should rain down on them. And that's when he understands that Aithusa is no longer bellowing flames at them.

She has stopped.

Arthur looks up and instead of the enraged animal from before, all he sees is a contrite creature, that birdlike, is craning her head at them. 

She half chirps something that Arthur doesn't understand and then takes a lumbering step towards them. 

Arthur is half tempted to try and put distance between them and the dragon. Protecting Merlin is his first and foremost consideration. If he had a sword he'd probably do a better job of it but even as it is he refuses to think it's hopeless. 

He can pick Merlin up, carry him away to safety and take him to the nearest physician. Surely in this day and age they can try something even if the ailment is magical. They say that modern medicine has progressed so far from the haphazard science that he knew of in Camelot that that's surely possible.

But then he replays Balinor's words in his head and he understands that he must let Merlin and Aithusa finally find each other and make peace.

Seeing as Arthur is not reacting aggressively, Aithusa lollops over to them, the earth shaking to the sound of her steps. Gently, she bends her long neck and pushes her head at the half-conscious Merlin.

As if the dragon's presence were stirring something in him, Merlin opens his eyes and sees Aithusa crouching over him. “You were my light, you know,” Merlin says, eyes wet with tears. He reaches out with his good arm and touches a hand to Aithusa's snout, spreading long fingers across the space between her nostrils. It's a gentle touch; Arthur can tell there's love in it. “You're mine.”

Aithusa gurgles something and Merlin says, “I'm sorry I had to take Morgana from you. I know she protected you. I know you loved her. I love you too.”

As he shifts in Arthur's arms, wincing and panting, Merlin tries to connect to his dragon. “We're the same you and I--”

Aithusa makes a sound that Arthur would take for agreement if he could claim he spoke dragon. 

“I'm so sorry I failed you,” Merlin says. “I'm so sorry I wasn't there for you. I don't even know what happened to you.”

Aithusa pushes her head against Merlin's stomach, nearly sending the both him and Arthur toppling backwards. Merlin laughs a pained laugh before he subsides in a way that fills Arthur with dread, his eyes squeezed shut, colour entirely drained from his face.

Aithusa tips her head in the direction opposite the one in which she was holding it before, trilling out an alarmed sound.

“I think you hurt him,” Arthur tells the dragon, knowing full well that the dragon won't get him and that he has no connection to it that would help his message sink in. “I think maybe this time I'm the one that's gonna be left behind.”

He swallows thickly. “I know I owe the world of magic. I know I should be ready to give up everything to make up for what I and my father did. But this... How can magic prosper without him?”

He's so choked words fail him. Merlin's walked the earth for so long he can't think of the world without him guarding it. He thinks Merlin deserves a shot at every kind of happiness that was withheld from him in the past. He doesn't think this is even remotely fair. Even if Aithusa suffered for the wrong doings of others, this is in no way a just reward for Merlin.

If he could bargain he would trade his life for Merlin as he did in Gedref, but this time there's no higher power listening because he almost killed off all magic. Good job he's done.

“Merlin,” he says, pulling him up to him to kiss his forehead. “Merlin--”

Now he knows it, dying is easier than watching as someone he holds dear progressively fades.

He thinks his upper lip might be wet and almost snorts when he goes over his own words from the past. No matter now, the wall of desolation about to crash on him makes the irony completely unimportant. “You must be strong,” he tells Merlin. “Like a knight, Merlin. Like a warrior. You must prove it to me. You must stay.”

He drags in air, watching as Merlin's fingers twitch "Come on, Merlin, don't be a coward now." Arthur lifts that hand, the good one, and kisses his knuckles, then he lets his fingers curl around Merlin's shoulders, digging in just so he can get a response. He suppresses a scream just because that's not what he wants Merlin to hear from him. 

The response he does get comes from an unexpected source; Aithusa washes them in her breath and as she does Merlin's eyes open and his burn heals before Arthur's shocked eyes.

Aithusa thumps her tail at the ground, chirruping, and Merlin grins at her, pats her snout and says, “Yes, my beauty, yes. I'm fine. I'm fine. Good as new. You did good.”

Arthur would never have though dragons could smile. In fact, they don't, but can come very close to it.


	17. Chapter 17

They're sitting with their back to the garden wall, ivy flourishing all around them, and look at the upturned crate.

Well, Merlin's sure that he's looking at the egg sitting on top of the crate rather at the thing itself. He can't answer for Arthur but he's under the impression that Arthur is focused on the same thing.

It's not as if that's not the one object that would claim anyone's attention and his gaze _is_ locked on the egg even if his fingers are twined with Merlin's. “So our latest quest succeeded,” he says.

“Yes,” Merlin says, “though I'd hoped you wouldn't traumatise the egg with your constant grumbling.”

“It's a big egg,” Arthur says, skirting the issue of his having been too loud thus nearly bringing down the cave's roof on top of them.

Merlin snorts but squeezes Arthur's fingers. “That's because hopefully there's a dragon inside.”

“But it's a baby.”

“Baby dragon,” Merlin corrects.

“Baby being the operative word, Merlin,” Arthur says. “The egg should be accordingly small.”

“You'll see.” Merlin grins. “You'll see when it cracks the shell.”

“If it's so big though,” Arthur asks, “how can we keep it? The house is what it is.”

Merlin's grin widens. “We'll only keep it for a month or so,” he says. “After that we'll entrust it to Aithusa.”

Arthur pouts. “But--”

Merlin takes Arthur's face in his hands and kisses the pout off it, tongue slipping past his lips to brush at Arthur's briefly. “They get big. And they deserve to roam free. Fly up in the sky." He winks good-humouredly. "That's dragon canoodling.”

“Dragon canoodling?” 

Merlin nods, and would laugh too, but he's got something to dot that takes precedence over ribbing Arthur for once. He turns to his charge and rubs his hands together excitedly. Ritual seen to, he heaves himself up, wiping his sweaty hands on his trousers. 

This is the moment of truth to see if the dragon race still has a chance to thrive. He hopes his powers are intact and not as rusty as they feel. His stomach feels a little hollow and his legs are more than a little unsteady as he prepares for his taks. He wishes his nerves won't affect his performance.

Attempting not to cling to conscious thought in favour of dwelling on his magic, his eyes slip shut. He concentrates on his bond with dragons. As he focuses, he hears Kilgharrah's voice. _“Name it, young warlock. Name it and it will rise.”_

“Albion,” he says under his breath and then again and again, voice ringing out more powerfully, until the egg wiggles, chips and cracks and wide mustard eyes fix themselves on his.

With his snout Albion picks at the shell of his egg, pecking his way out of the cover, making his breakthrough. It wriggles out through the cracks and hops off the crate and towards Merlin. 

Merlin feels a little bit teary eyed at that. Just a tiny bit. He's sure Arthur won't even notice. He'd never hear the end of it if he did.

“Your dragon's a bit gangly,” Arthur says. “I thought dragons would be majestic.”

Albion toddles forwards, picking at the laces of Merlin's shoes, then he stands on his his hind-legs and spreads first one wing, then the other. 

“Shut up, Arthur. It's got all the time in the world to become that.”

Merlin knows that Arthur's sidling closer because he hears the rustling of his clothes. 

Arthur places his arms around him and his mouth to his temple. “Now don't sound so prickly. It's a nice dragon.”

Merlin turns around and catches Arthur's mouth with his in a quick kiss. “I'm not prickly. You have no eye for the beauty that is magic.”

Arthur's return kiss is wet and sloppy. As he withdraws he catches Merlin's upper lip between his before actually backing away. “I think I do have an eye for magical beings.”

“I didn't mean it that way,” Merlin says. 

Arthur rolls his eyes at him. “I didn't either.”

“I think you did,” Merlin says. “You witnessed a beautiful thing and--”

Arthur stops him by tipping his head back, palming his skull. “Lighten up, Merlin, I love that magic's back. And the baby dragon is, dare I say it, sufficiently cute. Now will you let me kiss you properly?”

“But,” Merlin says, mock innocently, “I'm not sure if it's a sufficiently interesting proposition.”

They do kiss but only after Arthur caught Merlin after chasing him round and round the house.

 

The End


End file.
